


A Family Is A Family When There's Love In The Air

by sullenhearts



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-29
Updated: 2014-07-07
Packaged: 2018-01-27 01:50:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1710590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sullenhearts/pseuds/sullenhearts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles and Derek are having problems in their marriage and are trying to contend with their four young, adopted, children - so adding another to the mix is a great decision, right?</p><p>AU in which Stiles is around 28 and Derek a few years older. Derek is a cop. Stiles is a mostly stay-at-home dad. </p><p>This fic is inspired in part by TV show The Fosters, which I recommend watching wholeheartedly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [deerie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/deerie/gifts).



“Derek.”

There’s no response. 

“Derek,” Stiles hisses, louder. He kicks his husband viciously but there’s still no answer. 

“The baby’s crying,” Stiles says. He kicks Derek again.

“Fuck’s sake,” he says, getting out of bed. His slippers are fortunately close by so his feet aren’t on the cold wooden floor as he goes into the little kids’ bedroom to retrieve Jacob before he wakes up Adam. 

“It’s a good job you’re cute,” Stiles tells Jacob when they’re in the kitchen and Stiles heating the milk with his free hand. Jacob’s cries have subsided to a low whimper and he looks at Stiles with big brown eyes. 

Stiles settles them on the couch under the blanket Melissa knitted for them. Storage Wars is the least mindnumbing thing he can find on the TV but he still feels his eyes closing and by the time Jacob has finished his bottle and fallen asleep Stiles is struggling to keep his eyes open and he falls asleep too. That’s where Derek finds them the next morning.  
“Morning, sleepyhead.”

Stiles jerks awake. Jacob stirs and whimpers. “What?”

“Morning.”

“Shit. Fell asleep.”

“I guessed.” Derek holds his hands out for the baby but Stiles ignores him, instead smoothing his hand over Jacob’s back.

“What time is it?”

“Eight.” Derek is already dressed ready for work. 

Stiles jumps up, alarmed. “Shit, I better get the girls up and ready.” They need to leave for school in twenty minutes and he hasn’t got any of the kids dressed, or made breakfast, or packed any lunches. 

“Relax,” Derek says. “They’re ready. I got them ready.”

On cue both girls, their elder children Charlotte and Lexie, come downstairs. Derek’s beaming, proud of himself, only the girls look a mess. 

“That is a Halloween costume Charlotte is wearing, and what the hell did you do to Lexie’s hair?”

Derek’s face falls. Stiles turns away, over to the girls, and tells them to go back upstairs. “I’ll come help you in a minute.”

“I can do it,” Derek says.

“You’ll be late for work,” Stiles says.

“Shit, you’re right. I’d better go.” Derek picks up his holster, wallet, and keys, and comes back over to Stiles for a goodbye kiss. 

Stiles turns his cheek to Derek instead. Derek kisses it gently anyway. “See you later.”

“See you, kid,” Derek says, using the nickname that strikes right into Stiles’ heart.

He doesn’t watch Derek leave the house but heads upstairs to deal with the kids. 

 

*

 

An hour later Stiles is pulling up outside his dad’s house. He dropped the girls at school and now has Adam babbling at him as they get out of the car. 

“Hey, sweeties,” Melissa says as she opens the door. 

Adam says something that ends in ‘Grandma’. 

“What was that?”

“He’s telling you to look at his owie,” Stiles says. 

“Oh honey, what did you do?”

“It was his own fault.” Stiles sets Jacob down on the floor. He toddles a few steps then plops down on his butt. It’s adorable.

“Have you talked to Scott recently?” Melissa asks, straightening up. 

“Oh, err. Not…” Stiles trails off guiltily. He racks his brain but can’t actually remember the last time he talked to his best friend. “Is he okay?”

Melissa shrugs. “They tried IVF again. Didn’t work.”

“Shit, really?” 

“Yeah.” Melissa’s eyes fill up. “They only have one more chance, you know.”

“I know.” Stiles rubs her shoulders sympathetically. “I’m sorry.”

“Thank you.”

“I’ll call him, okay?”

Melissa nods. “Today?”

“Sure, I mean I have work right now and then I have a meeting with Isaac, but–”

Melissa looks like she’s about to cry again. 

“Today, of course,” Stiles swallows. “I promise.” 

“Thank you.”

“Listen, I gotta run.” Stiles leans down to kiss and whisper goodbye to Adam so that he can leave before Jacob realizes he’s about to go and starts crying.

Stiles has read the literature and knows that clinginess is a natural thing for any baby but especially adopted babies, but it still worries him. He mentally adds ‘Scott’ to his list of worries and sets off for work.

 

*

 

“Good morning, may I help you with your packing?” Stiles says absent-mindedly to the next customer in line. Only when he catches sight of the uniform does he realise it’s his dad. “Oh, hey.”

“Hey, son. How are you?”

“I’m okay.” Stiles starts to scan his dad’s groceries. “You? Long shift?”

The sheriff looks tired. He nods. “Yeah. Left Derek working on a case I’d been dealing with all night.”

“I’ve told you to retire. No one would think any the worse of you.”

“I can’t afford to retire,” Sheriff says, a long-used argument that Stiles is sure is bull. His dad just can’t imagine not being needed in the same way anymore . 

“You can’t afford to keep buying crap like this,” Stiles says, frowning at the sugary treats he’s ringing up. “Melissa will kill you.”

“You leave her out of this,” Sheriff grins. “Besides, how do you know that I’m not going home to share these with her?”

“Because she’d never let you. And because the boys are there, so she’d double never let you.”

Sheriff shrugs and hands over a twenty. 

Stiles gives him the change. “I’ll be there after school pick-up to get the boys , okay?”

“Sure, see you soon.” Sheriff picks up his bags and grins as he walks away. 

“Don’t get my children hyped up on sugar!” Stiles calls after him before turning his attention to the next customer. 

At one-thirty Victoria Argent relieves him from the checkout. “Short shift.”

“Sure,” Stiles says. “Now I have to go meet my daughters’ social worker before I pick them up from school and then go get my boys.”

“Some of us don’t have the luxury of picking up our children,” Victoria says. “Some of us need our full time wages.”

 _My wages paid my mortgage last month_ , Stiles thinks. He says nothing, though, just lets Victoria takes his place at the counter. 

It’s already 1:40 by the time he gets out and the place he’s meeting Isaac is way across town and there might not be parking. Plus he’ll have to leave at 2:45 to get the girls unless he calls Melissa, but he doesn’t like to do that since she already does most of the day care . He steps on the gas to get there, squeezes the SUV into a tiny space, and makes it into the coffee shop at only ten after two. Isaac is, of course, already there and looking as unruffled as ever. 

“Hey, sorry,” Stiles says, reaching out to shake Isaac’s hand.

“No problem. Been at work?” Isaac nods towards Stiles’ K-Mart polo shirt. 

“Yeah. Hey so what can I get you?”

“My treat. Americano right?”

“Sure. Thank you.”

“Can I get you anything to eat?”

Stiles’ stomach rumbles and he realises he hasn’t eaten all day, but he’s pretty sure it’s going too far to bum lunch from your social worker. “No, I’m good, thank you.”

Isaac comes back a few minutes later with the coffee. “So how are Lottie and Lexie doing?”

“Well, Lottie is going by Charlotte now. She requested it.” 

“Okay.” Isaac makes a note on his paper. “And she’s been asking about their mom?”

“Yeah. I know at the time Derek and I didn’t ask many questions about her… We were inexperienced I guess.”

“Sure, of course.” Isaac keeps writing, making Stiles look at the top of his sandy head. “How much do the girls remember, do you think?”

They’d come to Stiles and Derek aged four and just about two . Charlotte hadn’t been potty-trained and Lexie had open sores all over her body from which she still has physical scars. The emotional ones, for both girls, run much deeper. 

“Charlotte more, I guess. She’ll talk about how she had to look in the trash for something for them to eat.”

“Okay. Yeah, that’s quite a memory.”

“It’s heartbreaking.”

Isaac nods. “Their mom,” Isaac pauses, “has been asking about them. She says she didn’t realize they’d been formally adopted, although of course she signed away her rights.” He shrugs. “She was maybe too high to realize it meant for good.”

Stiles’ heart clenches. “She can’t get them, though, can she?”

“No, of course not. I mean, when you guys were fostering them there was a chance she’d get them back if she’d cleaned herself up, and maybe she clung to that. But she did agree to the adoption and that was formalized years ago.”

“So then why is she asking?”

“Well.” Another pause. “If you guys agreed, she could have supervised access.”

“No way.”

“Listen, it’s not necessarily what I’d advise either, but I do have to ask.”

“They’re _ours_. She was a terrible mother, Isaac.”

“I know, I know. But please just talk it over with Derek and get back to me?”

Stiles shrugs. “I can tell you right now what his answer will be.”

“Please? For me?”

“Fine.”

“Thank you.”

“How are the boys doing?” Isaac asks after a pause. He’s not their social worker, since that involved a different, international agency, but he takes an interest in them anyway. 

“Okay, I think. Jacob is really clingy with me at the moment and Adam’s speech is still a little delayed, but they’re both doing well.”

“Good. Good.” Isaac hesitates. “Listen, Stiles, you know how you guys are still registered to take teenagers?”

“Shit.” Stiles stops. He and Derek did months of training about fostering teenagers, with a view to doing short term fostering, but that had been before Adam and Jacob had come along and everything else had happened. Stiles had forgotten all about it. 

“I have a kid,” Isaac says quickly. “She’s 15, she’s in desperate need of a place to stay for a little while.” 

“I don’t –”

“It may be a week or it may be a couple months, I don’t know, but I’m really desperate – Stiles, please.”

“Really, it’s not a good time right now.”

“She just got out of juvie , Stiles. I was hoping that staying with a cop and his family might straighten her out a little.”

“You want me to take home a juvie kid to live with my children?”

“She’s not dangerous.”

“Right, but–”

“You did the training, Stiles. You’ll be fine.”

Stiles says nothing.

“It would seriously be helping me out, and as soon as I can find another place she’ll be gone.”

“My heart breaks for her, really, it does, but I’m sure you could find somewhere else.”

Isaac chews his lip. “She’s gay, Stiles. It’s proving difficult to find her a home that will accept that.”

Stiles opens his mouth to speak but shuts it again, “Shit.”

“I know. So not only do you have the cop thing going for you, but,” Isaac is all meaningful pauses today, apparently. “You can see why I thought of you.”

Stiles sighs. “Okay, fine. Where is she?”

“I have to go pick her up from juvenile hall.”

“She’s getting out _right now_?”

Isaac nods. “Is that a problem?”

“Let me go call my dad to pick up the girls. Jesus Christ, Isaac, talk about springing it on me.” Stiles stands up and goes outside to make the call.

 

*

 

A couple hours later Stiles has the girl, Esther, next to him in the van. “So hey, I’m Stiles. Nice to meet you.”

“What does that mean?” she asks, looking straight ahead, not at him. 

“It’s my nickname. It’s short for my surname, Stilinski.”

“What the hell kind of surname is that?”

“It’s Polish.”

“So what’s your real first name? What do I call you?”

“Just Stiles. Everyone else calls me that.”

“No one ever calls you anything else?”

“No one except my mom, and she died a lot of years ago. She was the only one who could ever pronounce it properly.” Stiles looks at her, but she’s still staring straight ahead. 

Stiles pulls into the driveway. 

“Woah,” Esther says. “Big house.”

“Um, yeah. My dad and I – we built it.”

“You built your house?” Esther grabs her bag from by her feet and looks at Stiles for the first time.

“Uh, yeah. It’s a long story.” Stiles holds the front door open for them. “Okay, this on the left is the den. Behind that is the dining room, no one ever goes in there. Here’s the living room, and through to the kitchen.” They go through. “Can I get you something? Juice? A snack?”

“I’m not five.”

“Sure, of course. I’m sorry. I guess I need to rethink my rules. There are only a few?”

“Okay.”

“Healthy snacks are here in the refrigerator or here in the fruit bowl. You can have two before dinner, which we all eat together. Um…”

“I’ll have some cheese?”

“Good idea.” Stiles grabs two and some juice and sets them down on the breakfast bar. His stomach is rumbling horribly so he breaks open one of the cheeses.

“So who all, um, lives here?”

“Well, we have four kids. Charlotte is nine, Lexie is seven. They’re sisters, they came to us through fostering and then we adopted them. That was five years ago.”

“Right.”

“Adam and Jacob came from Poland around a year ago. Adam is four and Jacob is almost eighteen months.”

Esther nods, looking down at her cheese. “So who’s your, uh, partner? Isaac said he’s a cop.”

“Oh, yeah.” Stiles hadn’t even thought to describe Derek to her. “Yeah, he’s the deputy here.”

“Does he have a gun?” He’s sure she shudders when she says the word. 

“Sure. At work. He doesn’t – not here.”

“Good.”

“You’re safe here, Esther. I promise.”

“Thank you.”

“He’ll be home soon, anyway.”

“With the kids?”

Stiles gulps some juice. “No, my dad and his wife take care of them when I’m at work. They’ll be here soon but in the meantime let me show you your room.”

Upstairs the house has five bedrooms and two baths. The front bedroom over the garage is where they’d planned for teenagers to stay. It’s nice enough, Stiles hopes. Esther puts her bag down. 

“There’re towels in here. A few toiletries if you need to use them.” 

She has nothing except her tiny bag and what she’s wearing. 

“Tomorrow we’ll hit K-Mart, okay? Get you some things.” 

“Thanks.”

“I’ll leave you to it, okay? I need to get changed and start dinner. You’re welcome to come down whenever you want, but dinner will be at 6:30 .”

“Okay.”

“Okay.” Stiles closes the door softly and heads across to his and Derek’s room which has an ensuite bathroom where Stiles, exhausted already and it’s only 5pm, decides he’ll take a quick bath. He’s got half an hour to lay here in the bubbles with the jets going and worry about nothing.

Except – shit – he’d promised Melissa he’d call Scott. He reaches for his phone and thumbs into favorites. 

“Hey.” Scott sounds tired. 

“Hey yourself,” Stiles grins. “Sorry you haven’t heard from me in a while.”

“I think it’s been a couple of ice ages.”

“At least three. I’m sorry. Your mom said the procedure didn’t work.”

“Yeah.”

“Sucks.”

Scott laughs bitterly. “Understatement. They had two healthy embryos to transfer but neither one took and we don’t know why.”

“How’s Kira?”

“Angry, upset. Blaming herself.” 

“It’s not her fault.”

“I know, and so does she really, but…”

“Yeah.”

“They’re talking about using donor eggs or sperm next time. Or both.”

“That’s… That’s gotta be hard for you guys.” 

“Yeah, I mean… For me, I don’t care? Genetics never meant much to me, and I only have to look at you guys to see you don’t have to be someone’s father to be their dad.”

“That’s absolutely true.” Stiles swishes warm water over himself. 

“But Kira… Inheritance and culture is a big deal.”

“I get that.”

“So do I, absolutely. She’s working through it, I guess. We’ll consider it.”

“Good for you.”

“How are you guys doing?”

“Oh, crazy, you know how it goes,” Stiles says, and then feels like kicking himself because Scott doesn’t know, that’s the point. “Actually,” he says quickly, “we have a new addition today.”

“Really?”

“Esther. She’s fifteen. Isaac twisted my arm into taking her on a temporary basis.”

“Wow.”

“I know. Crazy. She seems okay so far.”

“Good. Listen, I gotta run, I have a meeting in five.”

“It’s home time, Scott. Go home.”

“Wish I could. Acrimonious divorce and the guy can only make it after five.”

“I’ll leave you to it.”

“Cool. Call me.”

“I will. Oh, hey, Scott?”

“Yeah?”

“How are you doing, with it?”

“Pretty shit,” Scott says honestly. “Thank you for asking.”

They hang up and Stiles gets washed, scrubbing his hair and face vigorously. He gets dry and throws some clothes into the laundry hamper. It’s getting full, so he does a scout around in the kids’ bedrooms and hauls the full hamper downstairs into the utility room off the kitchen. He throws a load in, angles his hip against the door to make it catch – yet another thing they can’t afford to get fixed – and starts dinner. 

He’s sitting at the counter checking Facebook and his email when there’s a noise behind him. 

“Hi,” Esther says. She’s holding a book from the bookshelf on the upstairs hallway. “Is it okay if I borrow this?”

Nearly all the books on there are from Stiles’ college days. He nods. “Of course, feel free to read anything you find there. You hungry?”

“A little.”

“Meatballs in marinara sauce and spaghetti, is that okay?”

“I’m vegetarian.”

“Shit, I didn’t know.” 

“Sorry.”

“No, hey, not your fault.” Stiles stands up and opens cupboards to see what else he has. 

“There’s eggplant here?” She motions to the fruit bowl.

Stiles turns to look at her. “Yeah?”

“I’ll have that in the sauce?”

“Good idea. Yeah.” Stiles sets about preparing it. He’s going to have to make sure there’s enough food in that she’ll eat, Jesus, something else to worry about. 

The front door opens and little feet skid through to the kitchen. Lexie is first. “Daddy!” 

“Hey sweetie,” Stiles says, rinsing his hands so that he can scoop her up. She kisses his cheek. “How are you?”

She goes shy when she catches sight of Esther, who is concentrating very hard on her book. Charlotte, too, looks at Esther when she comes through and sidles over to Stiles. 

“Hey now, you can’t fool me,” Stiles says to them. “Neither of you is shy. Say hi to Esther. She’s going to stay with us for a little while, okay?”

Charlotte nods. “Hi.”

Lexis buries her head in Stiles’ neck. His dad is in the doorway with Jacob. 

“Nice to meet you,” Sheriff says. “I’m Stiles’ dad.”

“Hi,” Esther says. 

“I left Melissa in the car,” Sheriff says. “Didn’t want to overwhelm you.”

“Thanks,” Stiles says. Jacob scoots across the floor on his bum and pulls himself up on Stiles’ jeans. “Hey, baby boy.” 

Adam is peeping around his grandpa to look at Esther. 

“She’s not going to bite,” Stiles says. “I fed her, I promise.”

Adam laughs and goes over to her. He says something, but it’s garbled.

“What?” Esther asks, looking uncertainly up to Stiles.

“I’m not sure. His speech is delayed because, well, because of how he was living before. I’m usually pretty good at deciphering, but even I didn’t get that. Adam, sweetie, what did you say? Say it again, slowly.” Stiles concentrates this time as Adam repeats what he said, looking anxiously between his dad and Esther. “Oh,” Stiles says. “He said what my dad said. That it’s nice to meet you.”

“Well it’s nice to meet you too,” Esther says, and holds her hand out for Adam to shake, which he does, nodding solemnly. 

“I’ll leave you to it,” Sheriff says. “See you tomorrow?”

“No, I’m not at work tomorrow. I’m going to get Esther some stuff she needs.. I can take the boys with me.”

“Okay, if you’re sure.”

“Of course.” 

The sheriff comes over, ruffles Stiles’ hair and kisses Lexie, who is still clinging to Stiles’ neck. “See you, son.”

Stiles says goodbye and sets Lexie down at the table, across from Esther. “Charlotte, can you set the table for me?”

“Okay.” She does it quietly which is completely unlike her. 

Stiles straps Jacob into his high chair. 

“He’s cute,” Esther says. 

“He is,” Stiles beams. “Although I may be biased.”

“That’s Jacob,” Lexie tells her. 

“I guessed. You’re Lexie, right?”

“Yeah.” Lexie looks away again, still shy.

The front door opens. “Hey guys, it’s me.” Derek’s home.

“Papa!” Lexie shrieks, and takes off again. 

“Slow down!” Stiles calls after her. 

Derek comes through with Lexie. “Hey everyone.” He catches sight of Esther. “Uh, hi?”

“This is Esther,” Stiles says calmly from over by the stove. “She’s going to be staying with us for a while.”

“She’s what?” Derek frowns at Stiles, but he pretends not to see. 

“Dinner will be ready in five, so go wash up.”

“Stiles?”

“Kids too, please. Go wash your hands.” 

The three eldest kids troop out into the half bath behind the stairs and Stiles hears the faucet start. 

“Stiles,” Derek says again.

“Get changed.”

Stiles has his back turned, but he hears Derek sigh and leave the kitchen. 

 

*

 

At nine, the house is quiet. The boys have been in bed for an hour and a half, both asleep easily like usual. Charlotte is reading, Lexie is spark out, and Esther asked if she could have a shower. Derek is at the kitchen table, probably reading so Stiles, when he comes downstairs, goes into the den. He’s flicking through TV channels when Derek comes in.

“Are we going to talk about it?”

“Hmm?”

“Don’t play dumb with me, kid. You brought a child home without asking me?”

“Isaac was desperate.”

“You could have called.”

“There wasn’t time.”

“There wasn’t time for a two minute call?”

“It wouldn’t have been two minutes, Derek. You’d have argued with me. Like you are now.”

“Because we don’t know anything about her!”

“Sure we do. She’s Esther, she’s fifteen, she just got out of juvie –“

“She just got out of _juvie_? Are you _crazy_?”

Stiles looks up at Derek. Okay, he does feel slightly guilty, but Derek has no right to be angry with him. “She’s not dangerous, jeez. Isaac said she and her foster dad in her last home didn’t get along and they got into a fight, so she was removed from the home.”

“So she’s violent.”

Stiles shrugs. 

“Four young children in the home, and you think that’s a good idea.”

“I think giving a child in need a home is a good idea, yes, actually.”

“Stiles, you didn’t even _tell me_.”

“Looks like we’re both guilty of that recently then, huh.”

Derek steps back as if Stiles has hit him. “You can’t–”

“I can.”

“That’s not fair.”

Stiles shrugs again. 

Derek sits down on the end of the couch nearest Stiles’ chair. “How long will this go on for?”

“I don’t know what you mean.” 

“Sure you do. You’re punishing me. You’re barely talking to me, you won’t kiss me, you–”

“Has it occurred to you that I’m hurt?”

“Of course I know you’re hurt. Jesus, kid.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“What?”

“ _That_. Like everything’s _normal_.”

“It _is_ normal, Stiles!”

Stiles bites his lip, hard. “Sure. If normality is not knowing how we’ll afford to pay next month’s mortgage, and if it’s worrying how I’m going to feed Esther or afford stuff for her to actually, you know, wear.” 

“So don’t bring another kid home!”

“It’s called compassion, you shit! She needs a place to stay and Isaac actually thought _you_ might help, given that you’re such a fine upstanding member of the police force.”

“Don’t be fucking sarcastic with me, Stiles–” 

“Then don’t make out like everything is normal! Two separate issues, dude. I’m sorry if you feel I should have called you, but what with _everything else_ going around my brain it slipped my mind. I saw a child in need and I thought that maybe, just maybe, we could help.”

Derek sits back. Stiles feels a small victory. 

“Okay,” Derek says. “It’s not for long, right?”

“Just until Isaac can find somewhere more permanent for her. But he literally had nowhere for her tonight, and we do have space for her.”

“Right. Isaac actually said he thought I could help?”

“Yeah.” Stiles chews a nail. “There was something else, too, something which swung it for me and which I’m guessing is the reason she and her foster dad didn’t get along.”

“What is it?” Derek asks, looking at Stiles again. 

“She’s gay,” Stiles says. “Isaac said he’s had problems placing her because of that, and if that doesn’t break your heart, then–”

“Yeah. Okay. I get it.”

“Thank you,” Stiles says. 

Derek moves to kneel in front of Stiles. “I’m trying, you know.” He’s so beautiful, and Stiles wants to reach out and stroke his stubble, cup his face and kiss him gently. But he can’t, he just can’t bring himself to do it. 

He looks at his hands instead. “I know.”

“I do love you.”

“I know that, too.”

There’s a pause. If Derek thinks Stiles is going to say it back, right now, he’ll have a long wait. Stiles doesn’t move. Eventually, Derek stands up and kisses Stiles’ forehead. “I’m going to shower and get into bed.”

“Okay,” Stiles nods. “I’ll be there soon.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles and Derek are having problems in their marriage and are trying to contend with their four young, adopted, children - so adding another to the mix is a great decision, right?
> 
> AU in which Stiles is around 28 and Derek a few years older. Derek is a cop. Stiles is a mostly stay-at-home dad.
> 
> This fic is inspired in part by TV show The Fosters, which I recommend watching wholeheartedly.

Stiles manages to mentally budget forty bucks to spend on Esther. They drop the girls at school and head to K-Mart where Stiles loads up the cart with the boys. “Okay,” he says. “I don’t have a clue what you’ll need, really.”

“Um, some deodorant and body spray?”

“Okay.”

They head to that aisle and Esther chooses a few things. She picks up a bottle of nail polish, too. “I’ll get this, okay?”

Stiles nods. “Clothes?”

“Sure, a couple of basics? Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, it’s fine.”

“How much would jeans be?”

“They have some cheap enough, sure.”

They go over to look. She chooses a few things. “Is this all okay?” she asks.

“It absolutely is. Okay, so what do you like to eat?”

They wander through the rest of the store. Stiles quickly decides that it’s going to be cheaper for them all to eat vegetarian for the duration of Esther’s stay. In fact, it might be cheaper to do that anyway. Esther’s pretty helpful at choosing things.

As they’re bagging things up, she says, “Stiles? Will I be going to school here?”

“I don’t know,” Stiles says. “I guess I need to talk to Isaac about it.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

Stiles hands over his discount card and his checking account card. 

“I’m sorry,” the cashier says. “That transaction’s been declined.”

“Oh, what the –“ Stiles racks his brain for what might have come out of the account. He could swear they’d had enough to cover this. Unless Derek…

Stiles plucks his credit card out of his wallet. He does _not_ want to be adding to that mounting debt but what choice does he have? They need food and Esther needs these bits. He hands over the card and tries not to notice Esther looking at him.

On their way out of the store she freezes in the entrance, making Stiles bump into her with the cart. 

“What?” he asks. 

She moves again, but she looks stricken for a second. She shakes her head. “Sorry. I thought I saw someone I know.”

That evening after dinner Derek baths the boys while Stiles helps the girls with their homework. Esther has finished the first book she chose so Stiles goes to pick some out that she might like. 

“This is Emma by Jane Austen. That movie Clueless was based on it?”

Esther looks at him blankly.

“Uh, anyway, this is The Perks of Being A Wallflower, which I love. And this is Animal Farm by George Orwell.”

Esther takes them all. “Thank you.” 

“No problems. I was an English major in college, so I have a ton of books.”

“I guess I won’t go to college.”

“Hey, Derek didn’t either, and look at him.”

Esther smiles and turns to Emma from her seat at the end of the kitchen table. She has her journal, a red dollar store book, close by too. Stiles would love to know what she writes in it, because she hasn’t said much so far. 

Stiles turns back to helping Charlotte with her math. Lexie is diligently copying out her spelling words, so she’s okay. 

Derek comes down with the boys, both in their pyjamas. He’s gotten changed too, and when he comes over to look at the homework he smells clean, and a little of his usual spicy scent. Stiles smiles up at him.

Derek smiles shyly back. Even Jacob, who usually whines for Stiles, seems comfortable in his arms. Stiles tugs Adam on to his lap instead. 

Derek rubs the spot between Stiles’ shoulder blades that is always tense and Stiles leans against his stomach. There’s a moment of quiet and it’s just normality, just like it used to be. 

Stiles wishes he could bottle this and keep it forever. 

 

*

 

The rest of the week passes in a blur. On Friday night after dinner Derek loads the dishwasher and then picks up his wallet and keys. “I’ll be back later,” he says, and kisses Stiles’ forehead. 

Stiles doesn’t watch him go, just feels his stomach in knots. 

“Where’s he going?” Esther asks. She’s playing with Lego with Adam on the floor.

“Oh, he has a meeting,” Stiles says, eyes on the TV.

“What kind of meeting? A work thing?”

“No, just a meeting.”

“Like AA or something like that?”

Stiles huffs a laugh. “Something like that.”

Esther chews her lip. “My dad was in AA when I was younger.”

“That… really?” Stiles really doesn’t want to talk about AA or anything like it, but she’s opening up and the training said to encourage that. 

She nods. “Off and on. He drank a lot when I was growing up.”

“I’m sorry about that. My dad did too, when I was a teenager.”

“The Sheriff?”

“Yeah. He was just sad, I guess, after my mom died.” 

“Your mom died?”

“Yeah.”

“Who is your dad married to now?”

“Melissa. She’s my stepmom, she’s also the mother of my best friend. I’ve known her my whole life.”

“I’m sorry your mom died. My dad did too.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Well, he was my stepdad, but I never knew my real dad and my stepdad was around from when I was tiny so he was always…”

“Your dad.”

She nods. “He died when I was eight and this all – my mom got – you know. Things got bad.”

“I’m sorry.”

She shakes her head. “Still alive, aren’t I? And, well, I like it here.”

“I’m real glad,” Stiles says. “We like having you here.”

She’s embarrassed by this and she turns her attention back to Adam, who’s building a tower made of only red blocks. 

The doorbell rings. 

Stiles opens it to find Scott and Kira on the doorstep. “Hey! I wasn’t expecting you.”

“I know,” Scott says. “We wanted to meet Esther.”

“And,” Kira says. “We brought a few things that we thought you might need.” She brandishes a couple of bags.

“Come in,” Stiles says. “Derek isn’t home but everyone else is. Can I get you anything to drink?”

“Do you have tea?” Kira asks.

“Sure do.” They go into the kitchen. 

“So how is she settling?” Scott asks. 

“Okay, I think.” Stiles goes through to the living room and scoops Jacob up. He motions to Esther and she comes through too. The others can be trusted to play by themselves for a little while.

Esther stands shyly in the kitchen doorway. 

“I’m Scott,” Scott says. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“Hey,” Esther says.

“And I’m Kira. I’m principal at Beacon Hills High, so if you do go to school here you’d see a lot of me.”

“We’re not sure yet,” Stiles says. “But sure, if she does.”

“I’ve been in five schools in three years,” Esther says.

“I’m so sorry about that,” Kira says. “Hey, I brought some things over that I thought you might like.” She hustles Esther back through to the living rom.

Stiles passes Scott a beer from the bag Scott gave him. He takes one too and takes a long gulp.

“Everything okay?” Scott asks. They’re both watching Jacob crawl across the floor. 

“Sure, why wouldn't it be?”

“Because I hadn’t heard from you in forever and you look,” Scott shrugs like an ‘eh’. 

“What?”

“Exhausted.”

“Just the kids, yeah? It’s tiring, that’s all.”

“I know that, dumbass. Four kids was exhausting enough…”

“Esther isn’t adding to that.” Stiles waves a hand.

“Okay, but you’ve had four kids for a year and now you seem…” Again Scott shrugs.

“I’m fine.”

“Sure?”

Stiles looks at his best friend and almost tells him. It would be so easy to let Kira entertain the kids for a while and spill his heart out to Scott. He’d listen and he’d probably want to help. He almost does it.

But Kira and Derek are friends, and Scott would totally tell her, and Stiles just can’t face everyone knowing. Scott might even tell his mom and then his dad would find out, and that would be terrible too. 

Instead Stiles shakes his head. “I’m okay.”

“Marriages have their ups and downs.”

“I know that, dumbass.”

“He still loves you.” 

Stiles swallows another gulp of beer. “I know that, too.”

Stiles gives Esther control of the remote after the kids have gone to bed. She flips through the channels as Stiles, Kira and Scott talk. They chat mostly about the IVF and Stiles is grateful that the focus isn’t on him.

Derek gets back at ten. “Oh, hey guys. I didn’t know you were coming over.”

“We turned up,” Kira says. She stands up to give Derek a hug. “Where’ve you been?”

“A meeting,” Derek says, looking at Stiles, who shakes his head a tiny bit. “Just a work thing.”

They accept this. Kira pulls Derek to the sofa next to her. “We came over to meet Esther but also to see you guys. It’s been forever. We should go out for dinner.”

“We’re on a bit of a budget kick,” Stiles says. “Can’t really afford it.”

“Well come over,” Kira says. “You can bring the kids.”

“They’re menaces,” Derek says. “They’ll make a mess of your gorgeous clean child free house.”

Scott and Kira both freeze and Stiles takes a sharp intake of breath. 

“What?” Derek says, looking from one to the other of them.

“Our second attempt at IVF didn’t work,” Kira says matter-of-factly.

“I didn’t even know you had a first attempt,” Derek says slowly.

Scott and Kira look at Stiles, who feels a tiny bit bad, because what with everything else going on he had just forgotten, but also Derek has no one to blame but himself, so he just shrugs. 

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Derek says. “That sucks for you guys.”

“Thank you,” Kira says. She squeezes his hand and he leans into her, and if it were anyone else Stiles would be jealous, but it’s Kira and Derek doesn’t like her that way. But it strikes him that Derek is a physical guy and Stiles has totally withdrawn himself from Derek. He’s angry and it’s the only way he knows how to protect himself but it still might not be entirely fair. 

That night, instead of lying right on the edge of their humongous bed, Stiles moves closer to the middle. Derek rests his hand on the small of Stiles’ back all night. 

 

*

 

On Saturday, they take the kids to the park. 

“You don’t have to come,” Stiles tells Esther. “You’re welcome to stay here.”

“No, I’ll come.” She puts a bookmark into the battered copy of Emma.

“How are you liking it?”

“It’s okay. Kinda hard to understand.”

“The language?”

“Yeah.”

“Stick with it.”

“I’ll try.”

They walk along to the park. Stiles puts Jacob in a baby swing and watches Derek with the girls on the slide. Esther and Adam are sitting on the swings next to Stiles. Adam keeps talking to her and she seems to understand. 

“You’ve picked that up quickly,” Stiles says.

“It’s not that hard,” Esther says, smiling at Adam.

Adam smiles back at her and tells her to watch him swing, which she does, and applauds when he slows down.

Derek is playing hide-and-seek with Lexie on the climbing frame, peeking round at her and grabbing her ankles to make her shriek. She slides down the fireman’s pole and comes running, Derek chasing her. He catches her twenty feet from the swings, scooping her up to tickle her. 

“Papa!” she yells, laughing. “Stop it!”

“Nope,” he says, but he does ease off slightly and eventually pulls her into a hug on the ground. 

“Papa got me,” Lexie tells Stiles very seriously.

“He does that,” Stiles tells her. 

“He’s mean.” She doesn’t mean it; she’s leaning against him happily. 

“He’s not that bad,” Stiles says loyally. Derek smiles at him.

“How did you guys decide that you’d be Daddy and Derek would be Papa?” Esther asks.

“Oh,” Stiles says, smiling to himself. “It was Charlotte. She called Derek Papa Bear because of his big ole scruffy beard.”

“You love my scruffy beard,” Derek protests, and rubs his cheek against Lexie’s which makes her giggle again. 

“I do,” Stiles says, but he feels self-conscious saying it.

Charlotte comes over with a daisy chain which she puts on Derek’s head as a crown. 

“Thanks, sweetie,” Derek says, and tugs her into a hug too. 

When they get back Esther paints all twenty of her nails carefully and precisely with the hot pink polish. 

“Will you paint my nails?” Charlotte asks.

“And mine?” Lexie asks.

“Me,” Adam says.

“Can I?” Esther asks. 

“What’s our policy on nail polish?” Derek says jokily to Stiles.

“Our policy is that anyone who wants their nails painted can absolutely have their nails painted,” Stiles grins.

“Cool,” Lexie breathes, and sidles over to Esther.

Derek moves to let Charlotte sit down. He kind of stalls in the middle of the room, heading to Stiles but clearly feeling like he won’t be welcome. 

Stiles moves his feet, and lets Derek sit down. His hands skim Stiles’ feet and ankles gently. Stiles is reminded of one time in Derek’s loft when they were dating. They’d made out for hours, just curled into each other. Stiles’ lips were sore by the end. 

If he’d known then what would happen, would he still have married Derek?

If he hadn’t, he wouldn’t have all these beautiful kids and he loves them so much and so fiercely, that he feels like he’d die without them. He’s a good parent, he’s sure he is.  
He thought he was a good husband, too, but now he’s not sure. They need to work on it. Don’t they?

 

*

 

Isaac comes on Monday. He takes a cup of black coffee from Stiles and sits at the kitchen table. “I can’t find a place, yet, for you,” he says to Esther. “I’m sorry.” He looks between them. 

“Don’t worry from my point of view,” Stiles says. “We’re happy to keep her for a while longer.”

“I think it may be wise to enrol Esther in school.”

“We can do that,” Stiles says. He pours himself some coffee and joins them at the table. 

“Do I have to?” Esther asks, pulling a face.

“Afraid so,” Isaac smiles.

“It’s a nice school,” Stiles says. “It was good enough for me.”

“And me,” Isaac says.

“You guys went there a million years ago,” Esther says.

“I’m wounded,” Stiles says. Upstairs Jacob is awake from his nap, they can hear it through the baby monitor. “Excuse me,” Stiles says, draining his coffee.

He decides to leave them to it for a while, so he plays upstairs with the boys for a while until he hears steps on the stairs. 

“I’m just showing Isaac the books,” Esther says shyly. “And my room.”

“Be my guest,” Stiles says. 

Isaac bends in front of the bookcase and picks a few out for her. She takes them then shows him her room.

“It’s a little bare,” Stiles says, sitting on the top step so neither boy can get downstairs. “We didn’t know what anyone who lived here would like.”

“I like it,” Esther says. “The bed is comfortable and clean. I like it here.”

Stiles beams at her over the bannister and she smiles back.

“Well,” Isaac says, grinning too. “Looks like you’re all set for now.”

 

*

 

“Okay, Jacob will need a bath and milk before bed. Adam may tantrum about taking a bath and if so don’t force it unless you have the energy. The girls can shower either tonight or tomorrow. They can have a snack for supper but no juice, just water. And NO cookies.” Stiles catches a look at his dad. “You’re going to ignore all of this, aren’t you?”

“No,” Sheriff lies. 

“Dad, tonight is a _school night_. I need my children _asleep at a reasonable hour_.”

“What’s the point in having grandchildren if you can’t spoil them?”

Stiles makes a strangled noise. “For the reasons I just said?”

“They’ll get to bed.”

“No sugar.”

“Stiles, kids eat sugar. You ate it and it never harmed you.”

“Dad, I have ADHD, how could you tell the difference?”

The Sheriff grins and opens his mouth, but Derek comes in, ready to go.

Damn, he looks good. Dark blue sweater, black chinos. He looks dressed for a date, not this. Frankly, he should be grateful Stiles found a clean t-shirt. 

“You boys have fun,” Melissa says from where she’s surrounded by kids on the floor.

“What? Oh. Sure. Fun. We will.”

The Sheriff half squeezes Stiles and for a minute Stiles wonders if he knows, and he also kind of wants to cling to his dad’s shirt the way Adam does to him when he’s scared. Instead he swallows and follows Derek out to the car.

“You okay?” Derek asks as Stiles buckles in.

“Smashing,” Stiles says without thinking, then kicks himself. It’s not the time for sarcasm. 

Derek says nothing for a couple of blocks. Then he says, “Thank you for doing this.”

“Did I have a choice?”

“Can you quit being so angry?”

“You make me angry. This makes me angry.”

“Do you want to break up?”

“ _What_?”

“Well, do you?” Derek’s eyes flick over and meet Stiles’ briefly. “We can get divorced and I wouldn’t want anything from the house… The kids could stay with you…”

“Typical,” Stiles says, swallowing down the fear that Derek might actually _leave him_ , that this might actually be the end of their marriage. “You think taking care of the kids is all I’m good for.”

“I didn’t say that, Stiles. I think you’re amazing at it –”

“Shut up.”

“– What?”

“I don’t want to hear you say that stuff. It’s bullshit, okay, it’s all fucking _bullshit_.”

“I’m sorry, I just –”

“You just ruined it, you ruined _everything_.” 

“I know, kid, I know – I’m trying to make it right –”

“It’ll never be right, Derek. It will never be right between us – ever.”

Derek pulls up in the community centre parking lot and guns the engine. In the darkness Stiles can see his jaw is set hard. “So why are you even here?”

Stiles exhales deeply. “I don’t want to get divorced.”

“Then it’s worth fighting for. _We’re_ worth fighting for.”

Stiles gets out of the car so that he doesn’t have to looks at Derek’s earnest face. He walks quickly towards the building.

 

*

 

“My name is Derek and I’m a compulsive gambler,” Derek says. His Adam’s apple is bouncing nervously and Stiles wants to take his hand to reassure him but he can’t. Derek continues. “It’s been one hundred and four days since I recognised the problem.” 

Stiles can’t believe it’s been that long. Since that horrible day when Stiles opened a statement for a credit card he didn’t know they had, along with a sheaf of red letters demanding that repayments be made. It feels like it was just a couple of weeks ago. 

“I guess the worst thing is the guilt,” Derek is saying. “The idea that I could have – no, _did_ \- jeopardise everything we’ve worked for. So I guess I’m glad that my partner is here tonight.” He looks down at Stiles. “It means there’s something left to fight for and it gives me hope that staying clean keeps my marriage and family together.” He bites his lip when he finished and everyone claps.

Stiles takes his hand when he sits down and intertwines their fingers. Derek raises their hands and kisses the back of Stiles’ gently.

The groups split after a while; the addicts and their partners in two separate rooms. Stiles’ facilitator, a brunette called Gail, smiles at him. “Everything you say or hear here stays between us. There’s no judgement. You don’t have to share, but you’re welcome to.”

They start talking and Stiles finds himself nodding when a woman talks about the possibility of losing her home. 

“Care to speak?” Gail asks.

“I guess that was – is still – one of my main fears. My dad and I built our house, but there’s a mortgage on the land and – yeah. It’s a real concern about paying it.” 

They’re still looking at him so he plunges on, giving voice to things he hasn’t before. “I guess too that it’s made me seem powerless. He’s – he has a good job, and I work part time so that I can be home for our kids. If he left, I’d be screwed. Reliant on my dad, living God knows where…”

A different woman picks up on this and the focus is off Stiles. He wipes sweaty palms off on his jeans. 

In the break, an older woman asks him about his children so he plays proud daddy and shows photos. He has one of Esther, too, pushing Adam on the swing. It’s weird, because she’s been there three weeks and already it feels like she was always there. 

Back home, the house is quiet. The Sheriff and Melissa are curled up together watching a movie. “Hey,” Sheriff says. 

“Hey,” Stiles says, and begins moving dirty mugs, sippy cups, and snack plates to the kitchen. 

His dad follows him. “You okay?”

“Sure. Were the kids okay?”

“Yeah, no problems. Adam took a bath without screaming.”

“Typical.” Stiles loads the dishwasher and sets it going. “Is Esther asleep?”

“She’s in bed, for sure. She’s a nice kid.”

“She is.”

The Sheriff hesitates a second so Stiles waits, leaning against the countertop. 

“You don’t think maybe it’s too much?” he says. “You already have a lot going on, son.”

“It’s nothing extra.”

“You know, if you need anything else…”

Stiles looks away, blinking tears from his eyes. “Dad…”

His dad steps close to him and hugs him hard. Stiles feels like a little kid again. He swallows repeatedly; he will not cry, he will not cry.

“Sorry,” Melissa says, interrupting them a few moments later.

“No worries,” Stiles says. “I’m okay.”

They say their goodbyes in the hallway, Sheriff chatting about work to Derek. Jacob starts to cry so Stiles goes upstairs to get him. As he’s walking downstairs his dad is hugging Derek tightly and Derek – is he crying? It looks like he is; his shoulders are shaking.

Stiles waits quietly. His dad doesn’t say anything else once he lets Derek go, just waves at Stiles and turns to leave with Melissa.


	3. Chapter 3

“Hey guys!” Kira says excitedly. “Come on in.”

They go into her office and sit down. Esther is nervous; her leg bouncing in her chair. 

“Don’t worry,” Kira says. “I promise everything will be okay.”

Esther nods.

“I just have a few forms for you to fill out.” Kira passes a clipboard across to Esther. 

Stiles takes them when she’s done to sign as her guardian. He’s skimming through the information when a familiar name pops out at him under ‘Mother’s birth name’. “Your mother’s name is _Argent_?”

Esther blinks at him. “Yeah?”

“You’re an Argent?”

“My mom is Kate Argent, yeah.”

“Your mother is _Kate Argent_?!” Stiles steals a quick look at Kira but of course, she wasn’t around back then, she won’t know the name. 

“Yes?” Esther’s face is confused and kind of self-conscious, so Stiles tries to arrange his features into something other than horror, but it’s difficult. He swallows, quickly doing the math because – don’t even _think_ it, Stilinski. 

Sixteen years ago around the time Esther must have been conceived, Kate Argent was sleeping with _Derek_.

Stiles signs the forms, his hand shaking, and leaves Esther in Kira’s capable hands. He’s going to kill Isaac dead. In fact, he probably knows. That’s probably why he placed Esther with them! Fuck’s sake, Isaac Lahey. Your name is on the shit list. 

First though, he’s got to see Derek. He heads to the police station, parks, and goes inside.

“Stiles,” Derek says, on his way from one room to another. “You here to see me?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“Oh.” An easy smile spreads across his face. Damn, it suits him.

Stiles shakes himself out of his reverie. “Can we step outside?”

They sit on the steps of the library across the street. Stiles was angry but it’s dissipated. This could – will – change everything.

“Derek,” he starts.

“Everything okay?”

“She – Esther. I think she’s your daughter.”

Derek stills. “What?”

“I was just at the school with her, right? And it turns out that her mother is Kate.”

“My Kate?”

Stiles rubs a hand over his hair. “Yeah.”

“Shit.”

“You said it.”

“She can’t…”

“Do the math, Derek. You and Kate where together then.”

“She would have told me.”

“Would she?”

Derek opens his mouth then closes it again. “I don’t know.”

“Exactly.” Stiles only met Kate a couple of times, later, after they broke up. She’d moved out of town and only came back to see her brother. Rumor had it that she’d never gotten over Derek. That would make sense if she’d been bringing up his baby by herself. “She never said…?”

“I think I’d remember if someone said they were having my _child_ , kid.”

“Fair point.” Stiles thumbs to Isaac’s number in his phone and presses call. 

“Who’re you calling?” Derek asks.

“Isaac. We gotta get this straightened out, Derek.”

“Are you crazy?”

“No – hey, I bet this is why Victoria Argent hates me – oh hey Isaac.”

They talk for a few minutes and Stiles hangs up. “Okay, he’s coming to our place in a half hour.”

“Can you talk to him?”

“No, you’re coming too.”

“I’m working, hello.”

“So tell my dad there’s an emergency with one of the kids.” Stiles stands up. “Which is actually the truth.”

Isaac is at their place when they get home. “What’s up?” he asks, stepping away from where he’s leaning on his car.

“Come inside,” Derek says. “Coffee?”

“Sure, thank you.”

Stiles follows them in, listens to their easy chatter. “Look,” he says impatiently, eventually. “Esther is Derek’s daughter, right?”

Isaace frowns. “What?”

“Esther. Her mom is Kate Argent.”

“Yeah?”

“So you did know,” Stiles pounces. 

“I’ve read her files, dumbass. She’s a kid I’m looking after. What I don’t get is why you two care.”

“Kate was my girlfriend,” Derek says. “Before you.”

“Oh.” Isaac looks away and Stiles curses again living in a small town where your social worker is also your husband’s ex-boyfriend. “You didn’t mention her much.”

Derek shrugs. “Who’s her dad?”

“Her surname is her stepfather’s,” Isaac says.

“She told me that too,” Stiles says. “She never knew her dad so her stepdad brought her up.”

“Can you find out?” Derek says.

“I’ll try,” Isaac says. “But you might do better to ask Kate yourself.”

“Okay,” Derek nods. “Can we call her?”

“Well.” Isaac takes a deep breath. “She’s in prison at the moment.”

“Of course she is,” Stiles says. “Of course.”

It’s a week later when they can go to visit her. The night before Derek sits down with Esther. They’ve decided to not tell her about the possibility that Derek is her dad, but Derek has been acting differently around her. Stiles despairs. 

“Listen,” Derek says. “Tomorrow, Stiles and I are going to see your mom.”

“Oh.” Esther looks incredibly young, a little scared. “Why?”

“Well. She’s in prison right now.”

Esther nods. “Isaac told me that.”

“Well we’re going to see her and talk to her about you.”

“Do I have to go back to her?”

Derek looks at Stiles. “We don’t think so? I mean you were in care before she went to prison, right, so even when she gets out…”

Esther nods. “I like it here. You guys are good guys and I feel… safe.”

“We like having you here,” Stiles says, and sits down on her other side. “You are safe and if it isn’t safe with your mom then you won’t go back there.”

“Good,” Esther says, and leans her head on Derek’s shoulder. 

They look at each other worriedly over her head. Later, when they’re wandering around their bedroom getting ready for bed, Derek starts talking with a mouthful of toothpaste.

“Spit first,” Stiles says. “Then talk.”

Derek grins a foamy grin but comes back cleaner. “I said, it’s the second time Esther’s said she feels safe here.”

“Yeah, at least.”

“That’s pretty cool, isn’t it?”

“Very.” Stiles nods. 

“Makes you wonder, though…”

“About what happened to her before?”

“Yeah.”

“I know.” 

“Does she talk about it to you?” Derek shrugs on his sleep shirt, which is gray, and beautiful. Stiles moves across to him, touches his thigh where he is standing at the side of the bed. 

“Not really.”

“I’ll try harder, okay?” Derek rests his hands on Stiles’ shoulders. “I guess I haven’t been thinking about her because I didn’t think she was staying very long.”

Stiles nods. “I think she’ll be here a while.” 

“Good.”

Stiles smiles. “It is good.”

Derek leans down and kisses him gently. Stiles tugs him backwards, up the bed, fingers furled in the soft cotton of Derek’s shirt, mouth on Derek’s. He likes the feeling of Derek’s weight on him, always has. It’s like home.

They don’t fuck but it’s the closest they’ve been in months and afterwards Stiles feels revitalized and fresh. He and Derek sleep curled into each other, holding hands all night.

 

*

 

Kate Argent must have a portrait in the attic or some shit because she doesn’t look a day older than she did when Stiles last saw her at least ten years ago. She’s gotta be at least forty, but she really doesn’t look it. She’s sitting the other side of a table as they go in, but she doesn’t look up until they’re seated opposite her.

“Hi,” Derek says gently.

“She isn’t yours,” Kate says.

“What?”

“That’s why you’re here, right? I talked to Isaac. You both got your panties in a twist because you think she’s your daughter. She isn’t.”

“But–”

“Derek, honey. You weren’t the only person I was screwing back then.”

Derek grips the table. “Nice of you to tell me.”

“You didn’t really think one high-schooler like yourself was enough to satisfy me?”

“Look, you fucking nutcase–” Stiles starts, leaning over. 

“Stay on your side of the table,” Kate says calmly. “You’re not allowed to touch the prisoner.”

“Would only touch you to punch you in the fucking head,” Stiles mutters, but he sits back anyway. 

“Kate,” Derek says. “Who is her dad?”

“You don’t know him. He was older than you. He never knew.”

“Are you lying to me?”

“No. Derek, if she was, I’d tell you, okay? Because she deserves to know her dad and because, since she’s ended up with you, she deserves to have one of her parents around.”

Derek stares at Kate and Kate stares right back. Neither blinks. Eventually Derek nods. “Okay.”

“Okay,” Kate says. 

“Okay,” Stiles says too, but he doesn’t really understand what just went on there.

“How is she?” Kate asks. “I miss her.”

“She’s fine,” Stiles says, softening. “She says she likes it at our place.”

“Do you have other kids?”

“We have four.”

“Jesus,” Kate says. “All teenagers?”

“Oh, no.”

“Just Esther,” Derek says. “The others are all small.”

“Do you have a photo of her? It’s been a while…”

“Oh, sure,” Stiles says, pulling out his phone. The only one he has is of Esther with Adam. He hesitates, because he does not want to show _Kate Argent_ photos of his precious children. But doesn’t she deserve to see a photo of her precious child? No matter what she may have done? He holds the phone out.

Kate blinks. “Wow.”

“She’s pretty, right?” Derek says. “She’s a sweet girl.”

“She is. The most beautiful. This is your son?” 

“Adam,” Stiles says. “He’s four.”

“You’re lucky.” Kate looks right at Stiles.

She doesn’t just mean because of the kids, he thinks. Under the table, his knee touches Derek’s. 

“You could bring her,” Kate says. “Please, you could bring her to see me.”

“No,” Stiles says.

“Derek, please. I want to see my daughter.”

“I’m not sure it’s a good idea,” Derek says. 

“But she–”

“She doesn’t want to see you,” Stiles says. “Derek, tell her what she said last night.”

“I’m her mother,” Kate says. “I have a right.”

“She has a right to say no.”

“Stiles,” Derek says. “Will you let me handle this?”

Stiles can’t believe he actually just said that. He stands up, frustrated. “She’s not coming, Kate. Over my dead body will that child come in here to see you.” He goes back into the waiting area and kicks the brick wall angrily.

“The hell is your problem?” Derek says twenty minutes later when he comes back through. 

“Excuse me?”

“Esther is her _daughter_ , Stiles.”

“Yeah and she got herself locked up in here so I think she forfeited any right to see her!”

“Stiles…”

They walk out together, Stiles banging the door that leads out into the parking lot. “You’re a cop, Derek. Bad people do bad things and they end up here.”

“People make mistakes, kid.”

“You’re damn right they do. You made a _colossal_ one the day you slept with Kate Argent.”

“Stiles.”

“Esther is _not_ coming here.” Stiles unlocks the SUV’s door and gets in. 

“Okay, but she gets out in eighteen weeks and by then Esther may feel differently.”

“No _way_.”

“Stiles, sweetie. By then Esther may not be ours to decide for anymore.”

Stiles shuts his mouth. His stomach turns over. “No…”

“We have to face that, sweetie. Isaac said–”

“I’m sick of Isaac Lahey being in my life, Derek. I see him more than I’d really like to because of the girls, and now with Esther, and last week–”

“Are you jealous?”

“What?”

“You are.”

“I am not.”

“Jesus, I don’t believe I’m hearing this. Isaac was a _long_ time ago, Stiles. You and I have been together for-freaking-ever.”

“Don’t I know it.” Stiles shoves the car into gear and sets off. 

“Listen,” Derek says, in that fucking cop tone that Stiles has been hearing for his entire life, “if Esther wants to see her mom, we have to let her. We talked about it when Charlotte was asking questions about _her_ birth mom, and you agreed then.”

“No, I agreed to ask questions, I never agreed to them meeting – Charlotte is much younger–”

“I know that, but Esther isn’t. She _has_ to be able to make that decision.”

“No.”

“Stiles.”

“Kate Argent isn’t having one thing to do with any of my kids, Derek.”

“Esther isn’t ours.”

“She could be,” Stiles says, looking over at Derek. “If we said the word, we could take her long term.”

“We can’t afford another kid, Stiles.”

“Yeah,” Stiles says, pulling on to the freeway and stepping on the gas. “Who’s fault is that?”

They keep arguing about it all afternoon but when the kids get home they shut up. 

“This isn’t over,” Stiles says as he heads to help the girls with homework. It’s a rainy, muggy afternoon and the girls are grumpy, bickering with each other and refusing to do their work. Adam is noisy, screeching at the top of his voice and arguing back when Stiles tells him to please be quiet. Esther is sullenly quiet over dinner in a way that Stiles hasn’t seen before and Derek just keeps shooting him Looks. 

By the time they’re clearing away after dinner, Charlotte having been sent to her room for refusing to help, Stiles has had enough. 

“I’m going out,” he says, thrusting Jacob at Derek. “I’m going to get a beer with Scott or something.”

“You okay?”

“I need a break.” Stiles pulls on his jacket and finds his wallet. “I’ll be back.”

“Okay,” Derek says. “Have fun?”

“I will.” Stiles drives over to Scott’s, calling him on the way.

Scott comes out. “Hey.”

“Hi.”

“Need a break, huh?”

“Yes. Sorry. It’s been a day.”

They choose a quiet bar on the edge of town. Scott buys the first round, which Stiles is more than grateful for, because he’s not sure how much spare cash he has. 

“So what’s up?”

Stiles spills everything about Esther and Kate, careful not to say anything about their other problems, even though he thinks that his frustration must show. He just talks and talks, going round and round things in his own head. 

Scott keeps buying beers and Stiles keeps talking. At one point tears prick in his eyes and he lets them spill. 

Scott hugs him. “It’s okay, Stiles, it is.”

“It’s not. Me and Derek…”

“You’re having some problems, right? All marriages have problems, bro.”

“Even you guys?”

“Even us. This whole IVF thing is so stressful.”

“We haven’t even mentioned that, I’m sorry.”

Scott shrugs. “Part of me is sick of talking about it. I feel awful that she feels guilty, she feels guilty because she thinks she’s letting me down… The whole thing is a mess.” 

“She shouldn’t – you shouldn’t.” Stiles swallows. “It’s not your fault.”

“I still can’t just get her pregnant just like any other guy can.” Scott catches himself. “Any straight guy.”

Stiles smiles slightly at that and they sit quietly for a few moments. “I’m way too drunk to drive home,” he says eventually.

“Me too,” Scott says. “I’ll call Kira.”

Kira comes to the rescue. They leave Stiles’ car where it is and drive home chatting quietly. Stiles lets himself in and tiptoes upstairs to bed. Derek is asleep on Stiles’ pillow. Stiles does what any good husband would do and walks around to sleep on Derek’s side instead.

 

*

 

It’s in the morning that all hell breaks loose. Derek isn’t starting until 10 so he says he’ll walk to work and bring Stiles’ car home, leaving his beat up old rust bucket for Stiles. The kids aren’t usually allowed in it because Stiles is sure they’ll all die, so of course they think it’s amazing when Stiles buckles them in. The front is a bench seat so Jacob has to be balanced between Stiles and Esther.

“Just keep a hold of his seat, yeah,” Stiles says to her, trying to sound more casual about it than he really feels.

Esther, to her credit, doesn’t let go until Stiles has dropped the girls off and buckled Jacob into the back seat. 

“How is school working out?”

“It’s pretty good. Some kids called me dyke but a teacher heard and they got in trouble. They have a zero-tolerance policy.”

Stiles nods. “Kira’s work, I think. She’s strict on that stuff.”

“She’s cool, I like her.”

“Me too. Scott’s a lucky sucker.”

Esther laughs. “Was he always your best friend?”

“Since second grade, when a teacher sat us together.” 

Esther nods. “I had a friend like that. Her name was Caitlyn.”

“Yeah? What happened? Did you lose touch when you were taken into care?”

“No… I told her I liked girls and she… didn’t like it.”

“How old were you?”

“Twelve.”

“Wow.”

She shrugs. “I just always knew. Didn’t you?”

“Fuck no.” It slips out before Stiles can stop it. “Sorry. No, I didn’t always know.”

“So how old were you?”

“Seventeen. Derek Hale happened.”

“How come?”

“He came back to town… Um, did you pick up he doesn’t have much family?”

“Yeah?”

“Mmm, well, there was a big fire and he lost his parents and sisters.”

“Holy cow.”

“I know. So he left town for a while and then when he came back he confused the hell out of me for a while.”

“So you’ve been together since you were _seventeen_?”

“What? Oh, no. We had a thing and then we didn’t and – oh, it was complicated.”

“If I wanted to date, could I?”

Stiles looks at her quickly. “Sure.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes, I mean, there’d be ground rules, like a curfew, but yeah.”

“Okay.”

“Do you have someone in mind?”

“Not yet. Maybe.”

Neither of them says anything else until they pull up at the high school. Esther says goodbye and Stiles touches her arm. He watches her all the way into the building before pulling away. 

He needs to take the boys to Melissa, go home and get changed, before going to work. He needs to pick up some groceries for dinner; he needs to schedule an appointment for Charlotte and a check-up for Jacob. He’s thinking hard as he gets back into the house that he almost misses the phone buzzing in his pocket. 

“Hello?”

“Mr Stilinski?” a voice says. “I’m calling from the bank. You asked us to notify you of any suspicious activity…”

“Yeah?” Stiles says, his heart plummeting to his feet.

“Last night there was a charge of six hundred and eight dollars to Pokerstars.com.”

“Oh fuck,” Stiles says. 

 

*

 

He needs to talk to Derek, only he has to go to work. He’s seething all the way there, takes several deep breaths and tries to put on a professional face. It must not work, though, because after barely an hour Victoria comes over.

“Craig wants you,” she says. “I’m to take over this checkout.”

“Oh.” Stiles stands up, momentarily turning the lane light off. “Hey, I only just found out that Esther is your niece.”

Victoria looks at him blankly. 

“Kate’s daughter?”

“What about her?”

Stiles frowns. “We’re fostering her at the moment.”

“What?”

“Uh, yeah. She’s staying with us.”

“She’s here in Beacon Hills?”

“Enrolled in school, even.”

“You could’ve told me.”

“Like I said, I didn’t know she was your niece.”

“How is she? Can we see her?”

“She’s okay. Safe with us, right? I’ll talk to her social worker, okay?”

“Yes. Please.” Victoria keeps staring oddly.

Stiles can feel her eyes on him all the way down to where Craig is standing at the manager’s station. “What’s up?”

“What’s wrong with you? I’ve had two complaints about your attitude.”

“Shit, I’m sorry. It’s just –”

“Yeah, I’ve heard all the excuses. Go and get a list from Wyatt and do some of the online orders.”

“Oh – sure. Sorry.”

Craig just frowns, so Stiles goes to the cold section station and takes an order from Wyatt. He picks up a basket and wanders, his mind on a thousand things running through his mind. 

When his shift is finally over he gets in Derek’s car and sits, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. He could go to the police station but that means dragging Derek out of work again, or risk a showdown in the station. Finally, he calls Derek’s cellphone.

“Hey, sweetie,” Derek says when he answers, and how dare he – how _dare_ he say that, like nothing is wrong, like everything is just –

“You,” is all Stiles can manage.

“Me?”

“You fucking – you fucking _dick_.”

“What?”

“Don’t play fucking dumb with me, Derek. I had a phone call from the bank.”

There’s silence. Stony fucking silence.

“I can’t do this,” Stiles says, realisation sitting heavy on his chest. “I thought I could, but you’re still an addict and I can’t.”

“Stiles.”

“No, Derek, don’t. I need my family to be safe. We’re not safe with you.”

“You are, of course you are.”

“We’re not. I want you to move out.”

“Stiles, no.”

“I need my family–“

“My family too, Stiles.”

“I need you to move out.”

“We’ll talk about this later.”

“We won’t,” Stiles says, and hangs up. 

The kids are subdued all the way through an early dinner. Esther escapes to her room straight after loading the dishwasher, and Stiles ushers the kids upstairs for baths. Stiles tells the girls they can read as long as they’d like to. Adam falls asleep, thumb in his mouth and blankie tucked under his chin. Jacob will not settle, not in his crib, not on Stiles’ bed where he sometimes falls asleep, not even on the loveseat in the upstairs hallway. Stiles takes him downstairs and sits on the couch with Jacob cuddled up to him, one hand stroking his back.

Derek would have finished work at six-thirty, but by the time his key is in the lock it’s almost eight. Jacob is asleep, his breathing soft and steady. 

“Hi,” Derek says in the hallway. Whiskey fumes emanate from him.

“Getting drunk is really gonna help,” Stiles says. 

“Only way I can face you.”

“Because I’m the problem here.”

“No – I’m the problem. I know that.” Derek comes over to the couch. “I don’t know how to stop it.”

“I don’t know how to help you.” That’s maybe the worst thing for Stiles to realise. He’s used to being able to fix things in his family. He can’t fix this.

“I don’t know either but I’ll do anything – please.”

“I need you to move out.”

“No, no, no, anything except that.”

“Derek.”

“Stiles – please.”

“Just go.” Stiles wipes tears away from his cheeks with his free hand. 

Derek sits on the coffee table in front of him. “I’ll see a counsellor.”

“We can’t afford that.”

“We’ll find a way–”

“ _No_ , Derek. I’m budgeting every single freaking dollar. I know there’s nothing spare.”

Derek rubs his hand across his hair. “You really want me to go?”

“If there weren’t five kids asleep or in bed, I’d scoop them up and leave myself.”

Derek nods. “Okay.” He stands up and smoothes his shirt. “I do love you.”

Stiles nods, crying for real now. “I just can’t deal with this.”

Derek nods again, blinking away tears too. “Okay.”

He leaves the room and comes back twenty minutes or so later with a duffel bag at his side. “I’ll call tomorrow.”

“Sure.” 

Derek leans down and kisses Stiles’ forehead, then the back of Jacob’s head. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry isn’t good enough,” Stiles says, but he can’t make himself be angry again. 

Derek pulls the door closed behind him quietly. The house is still. Stiles moves, heading upstairs to put Jacob in his crib. As he starts on the bottom step a noise from above alerts him. Esther is on the landing. 

“Is it because of me?” she asks.

“Sweetheart, no. Most definitely not because of you.”

“Are you sure?”

Stiles ducks into the boys’ room and settles Jacob in his crib. Back on the landing, Esther is chewing a nail. 

“I’m sorry.”

“Esther, it really isn’t you.”

“I thought you guys were happy.”

Stiles takes a deep breath. “Marriage is difficult.”

“Mmm.”

“Go to sleep, okay? It’ll be okay in the morning.”

She nods. “Thanks, you know. For everything.”

Stiles heads down the stairs again, set on picking up the house before he himself turns in for an early night. “You’re real welcome, sweetheart. Just don’t even think it’s about you, okay?”

“Okay,” Esther says. A couple of moments later Stiles hears the soft snick of her door closing.


	4. Chapter 4

Stiles calls in sick to work the next day. He’ll miss the pay, sure, but he also needs to concentrate for the whole day, on the kids and on the house and on what he’s going to do next. He texts Melissa to say he won’t be bringing the boys over and gets “Okay ” back from her, so he figures that’s okay. He gets all the girls off to school and settles the boys in the kitchen, happily playing with the sand and water tray in there. 

There’s a knock at the door. It’s Stiles’ dad.

“Hey,” Stiles says. “What’s up?”

“Son.” 

“Come in. Did Melissa send you?”

“No. She’s taken advantage of her day off and gone out.”

“Okay.” Stiles heads back into the kitchen. 

His dad follows him. “Derek stayed at ours last night.”

Stiles turns around. “What?”

“He showed up, upset, real upset.”

“Sure.”

“He told me everything.”

“He what?”

“Stiles, son. You should’ve told me, you dumbass. I could’ve fixed it.”

“How exactly?”

The Sheriff pulls a checkbook out of his pocket. “Derek says the debt is around twenty grand.”

“Jesus, dad.”

“How much exactly?”

“I’m not letting you pay it.”

“I’m not giving you a choice.”

“Dad.” Stiles knows the number as much as if it was carved on his chest. “You’re not paying it.”

“Son, this isn’t a negotiation. I have money, money left from your mom’s life insurance, money that is meant for you when anything happens to me.”

“It’s _your_ money and this is my – our – problem.”

“Sure. But I love you and I love Derek, and he’s – he’s suffering.”

“So am I.”

“I know. You look like a pile of crap, by the way.”

“Well, thanks.”

“Derek does too.”

“I didn’t think he’d come to you.”

“Where else did you think he’d go?”

Stiles sits down at the table. “A motel, maybe.”

“He says he thought about that, but he knew you’d freak out about the money.”

“He’s got a point.”

Sheriff sits down too, pen poised over the checkbook. “So, I pay it off and get debt collectors off your back. You can pay it back to me in increments, right?”

“It’s your money.”

“And it’s earning jack shit in interest and you’re my son and I’m helping you.”

Stiles rests his head on his arms at the table, trying to hide the tears from his dad. The Sheriff comes round the table and puts his arms around Stiles’ shoulders. Stiles turns into his dad’s arms, feeling like a kid again, face smushed against the soft cotton of his dad’s uniform shirt. 

“Son,” Sheriff says. “You’re the most stupid kid I ever knew.”

“What? Why?”

“Because you should’ve told me. Me and Melissa. We could have helped.”

“I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. I’m so ashamed, Dad.”

Sheriff pulls back to look at Stiles. “He’s an addict, son. Addicts do stupid things that endanger their families.”

Stiles thinks back to how his dad was drinking when his mom was ill, and after, once she’d died. His dad had been drinking a lot, way too much, until finally they’d had a visit from CPS. Just a warning visit that shook his dad back to his senses. He hadn’t exactly ever been endangered, but he takes his dad’s meaning. “I don’t know what to do.”

“The three of us stayed up late talking. He wants to get help, he’s accepted that he has a problem.”

“He was doing well.”

Sheriff nods. “So what happened the night before last?”

“I don’t know. No, I do know. We went to see Kate and I guess it unsettled him.”

Sheriff nods. “He talked about it a little. How he thought he was Esther’s dad.”

“Yeah. She says he isn’t. I guess he believes her.”

“You could get a paternity test.” 

Stiles shrugs. “I guess I’ve no reason to disbelieve her either. She just – she knows how to push his buttons.”

“So he was feeling down and he gambled.”

“Yeah. I feel crappy because I wasn’t home.” 

“Where we you?”

“I needed a break. I felt shitty too and the kids were on my last nerve, so I met Scott for a couple beers.”

“That’s allowed, Stiles. You’re allowed to need a break too.”

“I guess.”

“You are. You work hard looking after the kids.”

“Mmm.”

“Listen, Melissa knows some counsellors from the hospital so he can find one, okay, and if you need it, I can pay for that too.”

“Why do you care so much?”

“You’re my son.”

“I meant about Derek.”

“Son, if someone had told me fifteen years ago that you’d be married to my deputy and have all these beautiful kids…”

“I know.” 

“So I care about him because he’s a good man, a good father… A good husband?”

“I guess so.”

“Melissa printed all this off.” Sheriff produces a sheaf of papers from the same pocket his checkbook came from.

Stiles unfolds them. They’re headed “How to Help a Compulsive Gambler”. 

“Go over to my place, son. Talk these through with Derek, okay?” 

Stiles nods. He can do that. “You don’t mind taking care of the kids?”

“Nope. I’ll even get the girls. Does Esther walk home?”

“Yeah, she should be back by three thirty.”

“Okay.”

Stiles stands up and hugs his dad properly. “Thanks, dad.”

“Any time.” Sheriff takes off his jacket, rolls up his sleeves and goes over to where the boys are playing. “So what’s going on here, guys?”

Stiles quietly picks up his keys and heads out. 

 

*

 

Derek answers the door. He looks like shit; hair everywhere and unshaven. “Hey. Didn’t expect to see you.”

“My dad came and talked some sense into me.”

“I’d say come in but that feels weird since you lived here.”

“Yeah.”

They go in and upstairs. Derek heads to Stiles’ old room. 

“Why’d he put you in here?”

“To remind me of the good old days?” Derek says, flashing a grin.

Stiles flashes back quickly on those days, on one time when he was 18 and Derek sneaked in through the window and they’d 69ed for hours, and later, when Stiles was in college and his dad knew about Derek and they cuddled up for hours after being separated for several months. His dad probably had good reasons for sticking Derek in here, even though there aren’t many of his possessions left, just a bunch of school books and his old lacrosse jersey. 

They sit down cross legged opposite each other on the twin bed. 

“So,” Derek says. 

Stiles laces their fingers together, his thumb rubbing over the underside of Derek’s wedding ring. “Melissa’s going to find you a counsellor.”

“I’ll go every day if I have to.”

“Okay.”

“Your dad said we can pay him back for what it costs.”

“Yeah.” Stiles nods.

“I know you don’t want to take money from him.”

“It’s just… It feels like I’m a kid and he’s bailing me out.”

“He’s bailing _me_ out.”

“Mmm.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I know you are. I believe you. You just can’t help yourself.” 

“I guess not.” Derek ducks his head.

“My dad gave me this stuff.” Stiles pulls the papers out of his pocket and smoothes them on his knee. “Okay. Number one is to limit your access to credit cards, debit card, to change your passwords and stuff.”

“That’s okay.” Derek reaches for his wallet and shills out his cards. 2 credit cards, a debit card. Stiles takes them. 

“I’ll go on the computer and change passwords.”

“Delete accounts if you can.”

Stiles nods. “Sure.”

“How will I pay for stuff?”

“I can give you cash.”

“Every day?”

“Sure.”

“Okay.”

“Sorry.”

“No, it’s the best way. I don’t go into casinos or anything, it’s just all online.”

“That leads into point number three – to replace the habit with something else.”

“Like what?”

Stiles reads: “Exercise, cycling, baking, or a craft like knitting.”

“Your dad mentioned some weights in the garage that I could take to our place.”

“Oh yeah? They’ve been there for like twenty years.”

“Perfect, then.”

Stiles nods again, feeling stronger and more like this isn’t crazy. “It says not to threaten to take the family away from the gambler, so I guess I owe you an apology for that.” He looks up into Derek’s eyes. “Sorry.” 

“It’s okay.”

“It does say to explain to the kids.”

“I can do that.”

“We’ll do it together, okay?”

“Thank you.”

“You are a good dad. They love you for lots of good reasons.”

“Thank you again.” Derek flashes a small grin.

“It’s the truth.”

“You’re an amazing dad, Stiles, too.”

“This isn’t about me.” 

“No but it’s worth saying. I look at you and it’s like it’s so easy for you. You know all the intricacies of their lives – all our lives, I guess – and you weave them all together into a family.”

“We are a family. A happy family, I thought.”

“We are, Stiles. I didn’t do it because I was unhappy.”

“So why did you?” There’s no undercurrent in Stiles’ tone of recrimination or blame. He genuinely wants to know. 

“I won a few games of Texas Hold’em at the station, won a hundred and seventy bucks. I liked the buzz so I went looking online. Couple of big wins and I guess I was hooked.”

“A winning streak never lasts.”

“No, I know.”

“You should’ve told me way before it reached the point it did.”

“I know.”

They look at each other for a few moments and then Stiles closes the gap between them and kisses Derek softly. His mouth is soft and yielding and he tastes like home. They shuffle down together on the bed and Stiles snuggles in, his hand on Derek’s hip. They lie like that for the best part of an hour, talking quietly and kissing on and off.   
It’s nice, more than nice. It’s going to work itself out. Stiles can have a little breathing room in the budget and pay his dad back without having to pay extortionate interest charges. They’ll get through it.

Later, when they go home, there’s a check for twenty five thousand dollars by the coffee pot.

 

*

 

The girls all look very worried when Stiles and Derek sit them down and explain it to them. Esther pulls the papers that Melissa printed off closer to her and reads them while Derek gently explains the situation in words the smaller girls can understand.

“It will be okay,” Stiles says. “We all have to help Papa, but he’s not going anywhere, and we love him, don’t we?”

Lexie climbs into Derek’s lap and hugs him and then Charlotte hugs him too and then even Esther goes around to do the same.

It’s only then that Stiles realises that when he thought ‘the girls’ he had included Esther too.

They’ve got to keep her. They’ve just got to. 

The next afternoon after work he meets Isaac for coffee. His dad’s money means he can actually afford to spend ten bucks, so he treats Isaac and they sit down together. 

“How’s Esther?” Isaac starts.

“She’s good. She seems to have settled at school. We like having her around.”

“I’m still struggling to find a place for her. Not a lot of families want a gay kid out of juvie. There’s one, upstate, but they already have four teenagers older than Esther, and I figure…”

“She needs more one-to-one.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m not sure she gets that with us. Four more kids, you know.”

“I know, but they’re younger, they have different needs.”

“That’s true enough.” Stiles nods. “Doesn’t it piss you off?”

“What?”

“That no one wants her just because she’s gay?”

Isaac’s eyes flicker. “It’s not like that.”

“Sounds like it’s exactly like that.” 

“A lot of families around here are conservative, Stiles. You know how it is.”

“Sure. It’s still bullshit.”

Isaac nods. “I know.”

“Victoria asked to see her,” Stiles says suddenly. “She didn’t know we had her.”

“Victoria?”

“Argent? Her aunt?”

“Who?”

“You don’t remember Chris and Victoria Argent?”

“No?” Isaac frowns. “Her aunt and uncle?”

Stiles nods. “We went to school with Allison, their daughter, remember?”

“Vaguely. I didn’t know they were in Beacon Hills. I didn’t know she had any family close by.”

“Okay, yeah, I get that.” 

“Does she want to see them?”

“I don’t know. I wanted to swing it by you first.”

“Okay, well, some family contact might be good for her. Talk to her and see how she feels.”

“Thanks. Derek and I are gonna do it later, together.”

He goes by the high school to pick Esther up, since he’s close by. She’s talking to two boys and a girl, chatting happily, and one of the boys comes over with her when she sees Stiles. 

“Can we give Ty a ride home?”

“Sure we can,” Stiles says, holding back from beaming.

Ty gets in the back. “Thanks, Mr. Stilinski.”

“You’re welcome. Where do you live?”

Ty gives an address and Stiles sets off. They’re still chatting, occasionally bringing Stiles into the conversation. When they pull up outside a clean-looking condo, Ty leans into the front to shake Stiles’ hand. “Thank you, sir.”

“It’s nothing. Nice to meet you.”

He touches Esther’s shoulder and she grins at him. He steps out and waves as they drive off.

“He’s nice,” Stiles says. “Respectful.”

“Are you seriously telling me that you like all that ‘hello sir’ shit?”

“It shows respect for your parents,” Stiles protests, then realises he’s referred to himself as her parents which she might mind, she might –

She just grins and shakes her head at him. “Hey, is there a Hobby Lobby around here?”

“Sure, why?”

“Well, you know the thing in the stuff about Derek? It said about taking up a new hobby, right?”

“Right.”

“One time my mom was trying to get clean and she taught me to crochet, and I just thought…” She trails off, suddenly shy.

“You could teach Derek?”

“Yeah. Maybe?”

Stiles laughs, taken with the idea of Derek, with his cop uniform and his muscles, learning to crochet dainty scarves. “Okay.”

In Hobby Lobby they pick out a number of hooks and tons of wool, all from the bargain bins. The books are all way expensive, though.

“Sorry,” Stiles says. “Maybe next payday?”

“Nah,” Esther says. “Look for ‘em on eBay.”

“Good idea.” 

They go to the register arms laden with yarn. On the way out Esther, concentrating on Stiles’ phone where she’s busy looking up books on crochet, bumps into someone coming in.

It’s Victoria.

“Esther,” she says.

Esther looks confused. Stiles jumps in. “Victoria,” he says. “How, uh, nice to see you.”

Esther frowns at him. “How does she know me?”

“Esther, sweetie, this is your aunt. She’s married to your mom’s brother.”

“What?”

“Chris,” Victoria says. “You never heard her talk about him?”

“Sure, sometimes. They had some stupid argument and didn’t talk.”

Victoria nods. “Over their father’s will.”

“Families, huh,” Stiles jokes, trying to lighten the mood. It doesn’t work, the two women are staring at each other. If he didn’t know better he’d say they were blood related.

“You look so grown up,” Victoria says. 

“I’m almost sixteen.”

“I’m sure you don’t remember us. You and Kate visited once.”

Esther nods. “I didn’t know that was here.”

“Yeah. Oh, sweetie. I feel awful. We tried to get you, we could take you in now–”

“But – you won’t, right?” Esther says quickly. “I live with Derek and Stiles, I like it there.”

“For now you’ll stay with us,” Stiles jumps in. He’s beginning to feel like a broken record with the number of times he’s said that, but Esther’s face shows him that it’s something he needs to keep saying.

“But we’d like to see you,” Victoria presses. “Why don’t you all come over for dinner?”

“There are four little ones at home,” Esther says so earnestly that Stiles has to look away to grin. “It wouldn’t be practical.”

“You come over to us,” Stiles says. “Allison, too, if she’s around.”

“That would be lovely,” Victoria says, flashing him a rare smile.

“Next Wednesday?” Stiles suggests. 

“Yes.”

“Cool.” 

“Okay,” Esther says, moving off. “See you then.” 

 

*

 

All the girls and Derek have a hook in one hand and a ball of yarn in their laps and Esther is patiently showing them how to crochet. 

Charlotte isn’t very good at concentrating usually but she doesn’t leave Esther’s side for the best part of an hour. Lexie gets bored and comes across to play with the boys. Derek concentrates so hard, a little furrow between his brows, that Stiles can hardly tear his eyes away from him. It’s adorable.

Dinner with the Argents doesn’t go well. 

They ask about Esther and her life, although she doesn’t say much, not even as much as she’s told Stiles.

“Why don’t you talk to my mom?” she asks at one point. “I don’t believe it was just over a will.”

“It was hard to watch her make decisions that destroyed her so utterly,” Chris says. 

“What about me? Why didn’t you care if she destroyed me?”

Chris and Victoria exchange glances. 

“When your stepdad was around he made sure you were okay,” Chris says. 

“I guess.” Esther looks doubtful, presses the blade of her knife into the dining table.

Stiles takes it from her gently.

“Excuse me,” she says, and stands up from the table. Moments later they hear her pound up the stairs.

Stiles knows he should apologize, except he agrees with her. Where the hell were they when Esther was being abused and neglected? He shrugs at Chris instead.

Victoria and Derek clear the dinner plates. 

“Kate wouldn’t let us near her place or Esther most of the time,” Chris says.

“So you just left a child in need.”

“Kate was mostly a very capable parent.” 

“Sure she was,” Stiles scoffs. “You tell yourself that if it makes you feel better.”

“We tried, Stiles. We told Kate we’d take Esther but she refused. So we called CPS.”

Stiles raises his eyebrows, surprised. “That was you?”

“Yeah. We told social workers we’d be happy to take her but Kate still refused even when Esther was in a care home, and I guess at that point they still wanted Kate to be involved.”

“So then Esther got lost in the system.”

Chris nods. “I feel bad about it.”

_Good_ , Stiles thinks, but doesn’t say it. 

“She seems happy here.”

“She is. She’s safe, anyway. No abusive foster parents.” Stiles lets that slip on purpose. Esther hadn’t mentioned it but Stiles wants to wound.

Chris looks away. “Is she staying here for good?”

“Until Isaac finds someplace suitable.”

“Oh.” Chris brightens. “So we could–“

“Over my dead body,” Stiles says, and then looks up at Victoria with a fake smile as she brings dessert through. 

Esther doesn’t come back downstairs, not even when Stiles offers her dessert. Christ and Victoria don’t hang around either. 

Chris shakes their hands at the door. “I’m glad she’s okay with you. Can we see her again?”

“If she wants to,” Stiles says. “I know how to get a hold of you.”

When they’ve left Stiles and Derek clean up the dining room, which they barely ever use, and the kitchen. 

“We should go talk to her,” Derek says.

“I want her to stay,” Stiles says. “Maybe not forever, but for a year or two, so that she can have some stability and not feel like we didn’t want her either.”

Derek is nodding slowly. “We’ll talk to Isaac first, okay?”

Stiles nods his agreement and shoots Isaac a text. 

They shut up the house downstairs and head upstairs. Derek knocks lightly on Esther’s door.

“Go away,” comes the answer.

“Sweetie, talk to us.”

“Don’t fucking call me sweetie.” The door flies open. Esther looks angry and tear stained. “You don’t care about me.”

“I absolutely do,” Derek says. 

“No you don’t. No one does. Not my mom, not Chris, not you guys. Not even Isaac!”

“Sweetie–”

“What did I just say, don’t CALL me that.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean–”

“You all think you’re so perfect, you have this perfect family and then I come along to ruin it.” Her eyes flash angrily at Stiles too. 

“You’re not ruining anything,” Stiles tells her calmly. “We love having you here.”

“If you did, you’d let me stay.” She looks back at Derek.

Derek falters for a second and Stiles knows why, because they know to not make any promises they may not be able to keep, but Esther takes it the wrong way, seizing on it.

“See! You hate me, you don’t want anything to fuck up your perfect lives!”

“Esther, no one’s lives are perfect, honey,” Derek says. 

“You think yours are! You think you’re so great, you don’t want a fuck up like me ruining it! I hate being here!” She slams the door so hard that it rattles in the jamb. 

Five second later Jacob starts wailing. 

“I’ll get him,” Stiles says. 

He settles Jacob without picking him up or turning the light on, just rubs his back soothingly. Adam stirs, but doesn’t wake. When Stiles goes back to Derek, he’s sitting on the floor with his back against the wall next to Esther’s room. 

“I’m gonna stay here,” Derek says.

Stiles nods. It was one of the strategies given in their training. It means that Derek can make sure Esther doesn’t harm anything, and that whenever she does come out she’ll see him and know that he does care.

Stiles gets him a blanket and pillow. 

“Thanks,” Derek says. 

Stiles kisses him. “Wake me if you need anything.”


	5. Chapter 5

The next morning Esther says nothing, just eats her breakfast with lowered eyes, and leaves for school before Derek has even left for work. 

Derek shrugs. “She’ll come around.”

Stiles is at home with just the boys later that afternoon when there’s a knock at the door. He goes to answer it and sees the familiar colour of his dad’s uniform through the glass, so he’s smiling when he opens the door and says, “Hey dad.” But then he notices the way his dad is holding his cap, and that look on his face, and the fact that Officer Parrish is getting out of the car too, and he just _knows_. “No,” he says, stepping backwards into the hall. “No.”

“Son–”

“Don’t – dad – is he–?”

“He’s not dead.”

“Thank _God_.” Stiles is only aware of the cool wall behind him. 

“He got shot, Stiles. We don’t know if–”

“I have to go.”

“Yeah, leave the kids with me and go with Parrish, okay?”

Stiles nods. “Okay.”

“I’ll be there as soon as I can be, okay?”

“Yeah.” Stiles only vaguely hears the words his dad is saying. He’s got to get to Derek, he’s gotta –

What if he _dies_? What if Derek, the best guy in the world, the love of Stiles’ life, the only person he’d want to parent with, what if he just isn’t there anymore? What the fuck is he going to do?

Officer Parrish thankfully doesn’t say much on the ride to the hospital, except to explain how it happened. “He was on the way home and I guess he called at the grocery store. There was a fight outside and–”

“I asked him to pick up a few things,” Stiles says miserably. “It’s my fault.”

“It’s not, it’s–”

“Don’t tell me it’s ‘just one of those things’. I’ve heard that all before.” Stiles rolls down the window and breathes in some fresh air. It’s all his fault. 

Parrish drops him at the ER doors and goes to park. Stiles heads to the desk. 

“You have my husband – he’s a cop – he got shot.”

“Follow my colleague.”

Stiles follows a nurse. “Is he alive?”

“Let me just…” The guy disappears around a corner. When he comes back he says, “He’s in surgery. He lost a lot of blood. We’re doing all we can.”

Stiles knows those words, where they won’t say one thing and don’t say another. He bangs his fist into the back of a chair. 

After half an hour Melissa arrives. “Hey, sweetie,” she says. “Your dad is still with the kids but Scott is on his way to them so that your dad can come here.”

Stiles hugs her gratefully. “Thank you. That’s kind.”

“It’s no problem. What did they say?”

“They’re operating. He lost a lotta blood, I guess.”

Melissa nods. “You want a coffee or something?”

Stiles nods. She pats his back and leaves him. The chair he sinks into is uncomfortable, but at least it’s there.

Melissa comes back with hot, sweet, milky coffee.

“Thank you.”

She rubs his back for a long while and Stiles leans into her. 

“What if he–?” he says eventually. 

“Stiles, don’t torture yourself, okay?”

“It’s my fault, I asked him to pick up some things–”

“Honey, do you have any idea how many people ask their partner to pick stuff up after work? It’s a normal thing to do, your dad does it all the time.”

“He went to break up a fight, he–”

“He’s a cop, sweetie. He’s trained to do that.”

“Yeah, well, he’s stupid for doing it.”

“Any good officer would’ve done it.”

“I guess.”

Stiles sets his empty cup on the floor and the minutes tick by. 

“It can’t be good that it’s taking so long,” Stiles says. 

“It could be anything. They may have had to wait for a surgeon, or an anesthetist.”

That makes Stiles cry, the idea that Derek have been waiting in pain, or is in pain now, or is already dead, bleeding out…

Melissa hugs him tightly, softly soothing him.

His dad arrives.

“What did you say to the kids?” is the first thing Stiles says, because that’s ripping him in half too. His beautiful girls. He hopes Adam will be too young to understand. 

“I told ‘em the truth,” Sheriff says. “I said Papa got hurt at work and that the doctors were taking care of him.”

Stiles nods. That’s what he’d have said too. “Thanks.”

“Scott will stay as long as he needs to,” Melissa says. “Kira too, probably.”

Sheriff sits down on the other side of Stiles. “He’s tough, son.”

“Like a pair of old boots,” Stiles agrees, and that makes him cry again because Derek is tough but that’s no match against a bullet. 

“We’re working on finding the guy, okay? He drove off but a witness got a partial on the plate.”

Stiles nods. “Thank you.”

After forty-five minutes Sheriff stands up. “I’m going to see if I can get anything out of ‘em.”

He comes back a few minutes later. “Okay, he responded well to surgery and he’s in post-op right now.” 

Stiles takes a deep breath because he isn’t dead he isn’t dead he isn’t dead. 

Melissa gives him hot tea this time. “For the shock,” she says when he pulls a face at the sweetness.

“I’m not…” he starts to say, but trails off. He figures as a cop and a nurse, they probably know best.

Eventually, eventually, a nurse comes out. “Relatives of Mr. Hale?”

“I’m his partner,” Stiles says, standing up. “Is he–”

“He’s stable. The bullet was lodged under his lung, thankfully. We’ve removed it and he’s stable.”

“Can I see him?”

“Just you, yes. He’s in and out of consciousness, so he may not be aware of you.”

“Okay.”

Stiles follows the nurse down a hall. 

“He is very drowsy.”

“Alright.”

Derek is alone in a room. The nurse checks a few things. “I’ll leave you to it.”

Stiles leans down, touching Derek’s forehead gently. He’s breathing with a ventilator and a mask over his face, but his eyes are fluttering open. 

“You fucking stupid motherfucker,” Stiles says, wipes tears from his cheek. “Only you, asshole.”

Derek makes a noise that might be agreement or might be an argument, Stiles isn’t sure. 

“Shh,” he says. “It’s okay. You’re here.”

The only answer he gets is Derek squeezing his fingers. 

Too soon the nurse comes back. “He needs to rest.”

“Yeah. I should go home, right?”

“He’ll still be here tomorrow. If anything changes, we’ll call you.”

“Okay. Thanks.” He leans down and kisses Derek’s cheek. “See you tomorrow, sweetie.”

Derek nods, but he’s fading fast. 

At home, all the kids are still awake. Jacob makes a keening noise from Kira’s arms. Stiles takes him. “Hey, baby boy.”

“How is he?” Scott asks.

“He made it through surgery. Thank you for this.”

Scott squeezes his shoulder. “Any time.”

“Were they all okay?”

“They’re pretty worried. We did homework.” 

“Thanks. I might keep them home tomorrow.”

Esther comes into the hall. “Is he okay?”

“He isn’t too bad, sweetie.” Stiles follows her into the living room. Charlotte and Lexie are all big eyes looking at him. “Hey,” he says, and sits down on the ottoman in front of them, settling Jacob in his lap. “I heard you were real good for Uncle Scott and Aunt Kira.”

Lexie nods, her thumb slipping into her mouth.

“Is Papa okay?” Charlotte asks quietly. 

“He will be with a lot of care, okay?”

She nods. “Scott says someone shot him.”

“That’s right. And Grandpa is going to find out who, okay?”

“Is he hurt?” Lexie asks. She clambers onto Stiles’ other knee. 

“Way hurt, yeah. The bullet went into his chest so they had to do an operation to take it out. But I saw him.”

“What did he say?”

“He’s a little too sick to speak, sweetie. But he knows we love him.”

“Can we see him?” Charlotte asks.

“I want to too,” Esther says quickly. 

“You all can,” Stiles says. “In a few days when he’s a little better.”

“Come on,” Melissa says. “Scott says you all ate and finished your homework, so I think it’s bedtime.”

Charlotte kisses Stiles and he hugs her hard. “You’re brave, I love you,” he tells her.

Lexie puts her arm around his neck. “Love you.”

“I love you too, sweetie.”

Adam gets a hug too, but he seems okay. Stiles stands up, passing Jacob to Melissa. “Thank you.”

Esther hangs back shyly. 

“You want a hug too?” 

She nods, so he puts both arms around her. She does the same to him, head buried into his chest. He doesn’t say anything or pull away. Eventually she does, her eyes shining wetly, and then she goes upstairs. 

Scott and Kira have made a simple supper of warm bread, salty goat cheese and baby tomatoes drizzled in dressing. It’s good. Stiles is starving. 

His dad is sitting at the opposite end of the table, tearing bread with his hands and smearing it with butter. “I called the station on the way home. They’re no closer to finding the guy, but there’s an APB out on the plate.”

“Thanks,” Stiles says. 

“I’m confused, though,” Sheriff says. “He didn’t have his gun to pull.”

“Well, he wouldn’t,” Stiles says. “It’s locked every night into the safe at the station.”

Sheriff looks at him.

Stiles looks back. “I won’t have guns at home.”

“And why is that?”

“Is this really the time to be arguing with me about boundaries I set in my house?”

“You were always around guns growing up.”

“And I was lucky.” Stiles breaks another bread roll. 

Sheriff keeps looking at him. “So I had an off-duty police officer on the street with no protection.”

“He has training in how to deal with shit going down without pulling his gun.”

“Stiles–”

“No, dad! You don’t get to set the rules here! Derek and I decided years ago that we didn’t want guns around our kids, and that’s the way it is!”

Sheriff looks away. Melissa reaches to stroke his hand. 

“Was he wearing a vest?” Scott asks quietly.

Sheriff shakes his head. “I don’t require it when off-duty.”

“He was still in uniform!” Stiles says. “You _should_ require it.”

“I’m not responsible for what my officers do–“

“I see now why you’re mad about the gun. You’re feeling guilty because my husband got _shot_ but you’re taking it out on me!”

“Now, son!” Sheriff starts angrily.

“Hey, guys!” Melissa says loudly. “Quit it.”

They both look at her.

“You’re both tired, and you’re both upset, and you’re both blaming yourself for what was no one’s fault except the guy with the gun!”

No one says a word. 

“The main thing is he’s alive, okay. Derek Hale is a fighter, we all know that. Quit. Arguing.”

Stiles ducks his head. “Sorry.”

“Me too,” Sheriff says. 

Stiles puts down the roll that he’s shredded to pieces. “I’m going to go to bed.”

Melissa stands up. “You guys clear up. I need to talk to Stiles.”

He frowns at her but she shakes her head and follows him. 

“Sleep well,” Scott says, touching Stiles’ arm as he goes past.

Melissa follows him right upstairs. “He doesn’t mean it, sweetie.”

“I don’t need you to apologise on behalf of my dad.” Stiles moves around the bedroom, turning the lamp on and closing the curtains.

“No, I know.”

“Like you said, it isn’t his fault or mine.”

“It’s really not. Listen, he and I will stay here tonight so if any of the kids wake up, we’ll deal with them.”

“You don’t have to.”

“You need to sleep. You’ve had a shock and you’ll need your strength tomorrow.”

“I guess.”

“I have some sleeping pills, if you’d like one.”

“Are you kidding?” Stiles takes the packet from her outstretched hand. “Why?”

“Your mind may not switch off, that’s all.”

He turns the packet over. 

“Let me go get you some juice,” she says. “Get into bed, okay?”

He sets the packet down on his nightstand and nods. She leaves, and he goes into the bathroom to get washed up. By the time Melissa comes back, he’s in bed with the covers over him. 

He takes a pill with some of the juice she’s brought. 

She sits down on the side of the bed and switches off the lamp so that the only light is coming from the hallway. She tucks him into the covers. 

“Melissa, you’re treating me like one of my children.”

“Damn, you got me.”

“I’m _fine_.” 

“You’ve had a shock, sweetie. And besides, I can’t be in there with Derek so I may as well do something useful, right?”

Stiles smiles at that. He is exhausted. He can feel fatigue overtaking his legs and arms. 

Melissa strokes his forehead gently, making the same soothing noises she made earlier in the hospital. 

“Thanks, Mom,” Stiles says before the wave of sleep overtakes him entirely. 

It’s the next morning before he realises what he said. 

 

*

 

Stiles sleeps straight through until 8am. He can’t hear any sounds of destruction from downstairs so he has a quick shower before heading downstairs.

“Hi, Daddy,” Adam says clearly at the bottom of the stairs.

“Hey, sweetie. Good talking there. Why are you here? Where’s everyone else?”

His dad and Melissa are in the kitchen, reading the paper and drinking coffee. Jacob is nestled happily into Sheriff’s shirt. He babbles at Stiles but doesn’t try to get away from Sheriff. 

“Morning, son,” Sheriff says. “Did you sleep okay?”

“I actually did. Were the kids okay?”

“Adam told us it was time to get up at five thirty,” Melissa says. “So we’ve been awake a while.”

“I’m sorry.” Stiles retrieves his phone from the fruit bowl where he’d left it the night before. “Should I call the hospital?”

“I already did,” Melissa says. “Pulled a few strings, you know.” She winks.

“How is he?”

“He had an okay night, considering,” Melissa says. “He’s still in the ICU, but he was awake for an hour or so, which is a great sign.”

“Can we see him?”

“Yeah, at ten.”

“Okay. Cool.” Stiles is hungry. “Did you guys eat breakfast?”

“Son, it’s practically lunchtime according to my stomach,” Sheriff says.

Stiles laughs, shoves a piece of bread in the toaster and goes over to his dad. He leans down, wrapping one arm around his dad’s chest. 

He doesn’t need to say anything. Neither does his dad. They’ve been through enough together.

Jacob grins and babbles up at Stiles.

“I know,” Stiles agrees. “Best Grandpa in the world, right?”

He goes back over to the toaster, from where he can see all three girls on the swingset, playing together, and laughing.

“They okay?” Melissa asks. 

“They sure seem it.”

“Esther’s a good kid.”

“I know.” Stiles wants to tell them that he and Derek want to foster her long term, but he can’t, not when they haven’t even told her yet. “I know.”

They pack everyone up and go in two cars to the hospital. 

“Okay,” Stiles says in the parking lot. “Papa is real sick, okay? So he’s going to be attached to a lot of machines which are helping him get better. They make noises but they’re not scary, I promise.”

Charlotte nods. “Like a breathing machine.”

“Exactly like that. His lungs are a little sick, so he’ll need some help with breathing.”

“Esther told us about those things. And one with medication in and stuff.”

Stiles looks up at Esther from where he’s kneeling down. 

She shrugs. “From when my stepdad was sick. Sorry.”

“No, hey, no problem. Esther’s right, Charlotte. One has painkillers to make him feel better.”

“Can he speak to us?” Esther asks.

“I’m not sure. He couldn’t last night, but that’s a long time ago. I’ll go see first, okay, and then come back out and tell you guys.”

They all seem okay, so Stiles heads in with Jacob on his hip. He settles all the kids with his dad and Melissa and heads in to Derek’s room.

Derek’s eyes are open.

“Hey,” Stiles says, and goes over. 

Derek’s hand finds his straight away. He pulls the mask from his face. “Did you yell at me last night or did I dream that?”

Stiles laughs lightly, blinking away tears. “No, I definitely did.”

“Am I still a stupid motherfucker?”

“Most definitely.”

Derek tugs him in, and puts the mask back on his face. 

“The kids want to see you. I’ve warned ‘em that you’re way sick, but they’ll explode if they’re not allowed.”

Derek nods. He looks pale, the darkness of his hair and stubble contrasting against his skin. Stiles moves a lock of hair off his forehead. 

“Thought I’d lost you,” Stiles says, rubbing Derek’s thumb in his hand. “Thought you’d left me to bring up all those children by myself.”

“I would never,” Derek says, pulling the mask off again.

“I’m pretty sure you need that to breathe.”

“Missed my lungs, dumbass.”

“Oh, because that fact is making all the difference right now.”

Derek smiles.

“Love you,” Stiles says. 

“Love you too,” Derek says. Then he puts the mask back on.

Stiles takes Charlotte and Lexie in first. “Be careful,” he says. 

They both look scared, so he shows them the various bits of machinery and eventually they talk to Derek. Lexie has a card. 

“We made it,” she says. “With Esther.”

“It’s beautiful,” Derek says. 

Stiles puts it on the nightstand next to the bed. 

When it’s Esther’s turn she stands in the doorway. 

“It’s okay,” Stiles says. “Nothing can hurt you.”

“It’s not that.” She takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry I said those things, Derek. I didn’t mean them.”

He holds out an arm awkwardly. “C’mere,” he says. 

She hugs him as best she can, her hair falling over his chest. She’s crying, Stiles realises. 

“It’s okay,” Stiles says. “We both know you didn’t mean it.”

“It’s stupid, I’m so stupid.”

“You’re not stupid,” Stiles says. “We both love you, Esther. It’s okay.” He reaches across the bed, across Derek’s body, and takes her hand. 

No one says anything until she stops crying. 

“I forgive you,” Derek says. “I promise.”

“I don’t forgive myself. Those things…”

“Esther, sweetie,” Stiles says. “You were upset with Chris and Victoria, right? I would be too. I don’t know why they didn’t try harder to get you in their house.”

She nods. “I don’t either.”

Sheriff comes in last. By then Derek is fading, clearly exhausted, but he makes the effort to talk to the Sheriff. 

“Hey, kid,” Sheriff says.

Stiles looks up at the nickname. Has his dad always called Derek the name that Derek himself calls Stiles? Why has he never noticed that before?

It occurs to him, not for the first time, that he and Derek may only have one parent left between them, but he is truly the best parent in the world. 

“I can give you a statement,” Derek is saying. “There were two guys–”

“It doesn’t matter right now,” Sheriff says. “We have witnesses and security tape from the store.” 

“Did you catch him?”

“Not yet. We have a partial plate so we’re doing all we can.”

Derek nods. “Thanks.”

Sheriff looks like he wants to say something else, but he just shakes his head and pats Derek’s arm. “Get better soon, okay?”

“I will,” Derek says. “I will.”

 

*

 

He slowly gets better. At the end of the first week he’s breathing a lot better so he doesn’t need the mask, just a tube into his nose. He’s sitting up, too, and looks almost healthy when Stiles arrives. 

Stiles leans to kiss him. 

“No kids?”

“They’re all coming after school with my dad. He’s taken some time off.”

“Because of me?”

Stiles nods, tidying up the stuff around Derek’s bedside. “And to help me.”

“Wow. Hey, if I’d known that was the way to get your dad to relax…”

“Don’t even joke about it.” 

“Sorry.”

Stiles is still fussing. Derek pulls him down on to the side of the bed.

“What?” Stiles asks.

“Can we talk about Esther?”

“Sure.”

“Can we ask her if she’d like us to adopt her?”

“Adopt her, like, forever?”

Derek nods. “Make it permanent. Make her one of the family? Then she’ll know she belongs with us.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.”

“God, I hope she says yes.”

“Me too.” Derek squeezes his hand.

When Melissa and Stiles’ dad and the kids arrive there’s the usual hugging and kissing of Derek and more pictures for him to admire – a card from the younger girls with copious amounts of glitter on it, and a picture of a round ball with a long tail from Adam that he grins over and informs Derek that it’s a cat. 

Jacob waves his arms dramatically at Derek, who reaches for him and settles him cosily into the crook of his right arm, away from the wound. 

“How are you feeling?” Melissa asks, slipping into nurse mode. She checks the charts at the bottom of Derek’s bed. 

“Alright. Ribs are achy.”

“You look okay.” She smiles at him. “Much healthier in the face, too.”

“I thought that,” Stiles says. 

“Listen,” Derek says to Sheriff. “Could you maybe take the younger kids to get something to drink? We’d like to talk to Esther.”

Esther looks up at her name, and frowns. “Am I in trouble?”

“No,” Stiles says, “Not at all.”

When it’s just the three of them, Derek looks at Stiles and Stiles nods at Derek like, go on. Derek looks at Jacob, still settled next to him, and then up at Esther.

“Stiles and I love having you in the house,” he starts. 

“Yeah, for real,” Stiles chips in. 

Esther just looks scared, chewing on her thumbnail.

“We would like to make it permanent,” Derek says. “We’d like to adopt you.”

The thumb falls from Esther’s mouth. “What?”

“We’d like to adopt you,” Stiles echoes. “If you would like.”

“No, but – really?”

“Yes really,” Derek says, smiling. “We like having you in our house. We like having you in our family.”

“Would they let you?”

“We’d have to talk to Isaac and the agency,” Stiles says. “I think your mom would have to terminate her parental rights.”

“What if she says no?”

“We’ll cross that bridge if we come to it,” Derek says. 

“If I talked to her – she might say yes,” Esther says, tripping over her words. “If I said how much I liked living with you and that I wanted a family and that it was what I wanted – she would, right?”

Derek nods. “I think she would. She’s made mistakes, but your mom’s not a monster.”

Stiles keeps his thoughts about that to himself. Esther is crying a little, so he puts his arm around her shoulder. 

“You okay?” he asks her.

Esther nods, turning into him. “I want to stay.”

“We’ll do everything to make sure you can,” he promises. 

That makes her sob harder. “Thank you.”

“Hey, no. Thank _you_.”

“What for?” she asks.

“Agreeing to join our ramshackle little family.”

She’s crying, but she’s laughing too. 

She stops crying after a few minutes. She moves and carefully hugs Derek.

When the others come back, Melissa and Sheriff look worried, but to their credit, they don’t say anything. 

“So,” Derek says conversationally to Charlotte and Lexie. “How would you guys like a new sister?” He looks up at Stiles’ dad. “New granddaughter, guys?”

It takes them all a moment to understand, but then Lexie shrieks and runs to Esther, and Charlotte says, “Oh my gosh, oh my gosh!” over and over again, and there’s so many hugs and kisses and congratulations that Stiles feels overwhelmed. 

His family might not be perfect, and it’s patched together from so many people who didn’t have anyone else, and there are gaps where people should be who aren’t anymore, but it’s _his_ , and he wonders how a sucker like him managed to get so lucky.

_Fin_


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Epilogue

_Epilogue_

 

It’s a few months later. It’s a warm summer afternoon and Esther’s adoption is being made legal. The kids are all decked out in new clothes and Derek is wearing this t-shirt that makes Stiles want to lead him up to bed and rip it off his chest - although he won’t because that’s not at all responsible parenting. Instead he touches his husband’s chest in the hallway as they’re on the way to leave and says,

“Hey, nice guns.”

Derek laughs, his entire face lighting up. He puts his arms round Stiles and kisses him. “Not looking too bad yourself, kid.”

“Well, I thought I’d make an effort.”

Esther comes downstairs. “God, you guys, get a room.”

Derek opens his arm to include her in the hug. She steps in, an arm around each of them. 

“You look beautiful,” Stiles tells her. “And tall.” 

She’d picked out a pair of green heels that Stiles is pretty sure she is literally never going to wear again, but she was so excited that he figures if they end up sitting on a shelf as a memento of the day they’ll have been worth it. Her dress is white with green flowers and was quite the bargain, although they’ve made a pact to keep that to themselves. 

“Thank you,” Esther says. “You both look good.”

“Thank you,” Derek says. “Are you nervous?”

“No? No. I’m okay.”

They pose for photographs on the porch before they leave, Scott wielding the camera, the three of them, with all the kids, Esther with each of them separately.

“Hey, my turn,” Sheriff says, stepping up next to Esther. “Is that okay?”

She nods. 

“Wait, me too,” Melissa says after a couple of shots. “Yet another one for my grandchild wall.”

There’s something in her words that makes Stiles look at Scott, a question on his face. Scott shakes his head a tiny bit, then winks. 

Stiles daren’t look at Kira. He’ll ask later, when he can get Scott by himself.

Derek and Esther went to see Kate and she had agreed to terminate her parental rights. Derek says she and Esther talked for a long time, both crying, and that Kate had apologized unreservedly for everything that had happened. Then she’d talked to Derek by himself, and had told him that she was happy if they were all happy.   
Kate has written to Esther a couple times, and says that she’ll keep in touch once she gets out in a couple of weeks, but Stiles isn’t holding his breath. 

Ty and a girl Stiles doesn’t know, friends of Esther’s from school, arrive, so there are yet more photos and then everyone loads into all the cars and heads to the courthouse. 

It happens faster than Stiles thought it would. He signs a form, Derek signs, Esther signs, and the judge smiles kindly at them and that’s it.

She’s theirs. 

Esther hugs everyone, laughing happily, and stays close to the tiny girl with the emo fringe and the plaid shirt. Stiles doesn’t want to say they’re a _thing_ , but they’re definitely acting like it.

Back at the house Stiles’ dad is in his element barbecuing in the back yard and telling the most terrible jokes. Stiles takes a hot dog from him and heads inside to get another beer.

Scott and Kira corner him on his way back out. 

“I’m twelve weeks,” Kira whispers, brandishing a sonogram photo.

“Congratulations,” Stiles says, putting his food down to hug her. “I’m so thrilled for you.”

“So are we,” she says. “I’m so scared to tell anyone, though, so we’re going to leave it a couple more weeks.”

Stiles nods. “Thank you for telling me.”

“I’m going to find Derek,” she says. She kisses Scott’s cheek before she walks off.

Stiles hugs Scott tightly. “Congratulations.”

“We used a sperm donor,” Scott says. “He’s Latino, said on his profile he’s a graphic designer.”

“How do you feel about that?”

Scott takes a second. “It’s going to be strange, right? I’ll look for similarities and there won’t be any.”

“Kids pick up mannerisms, too, you’ll see. If I had a dollar for every time Lexie pulls a face like Derek, I’d be a rich man. Your kid will be like you too.”

Scott smiles. “I like that.”

Stiles nods. 

“But, also, he or she is going to be like Kira, and she’s pretty special.”

“She is.”

“I’m scared I’ll be a terrible dad.”

“Scott, we all are. That’s what makes a halfway decent parent.”

“You sure?”

“It’s absolutely the only thing I know,” Stiles says, and slings his arm around Scott’s shoulder as they go outside. 

 

*

 

A couple of months later they’re camping. Stiles and Derek are paying back the Sheriff as quickly as they can, so vacations are pretty much out of the question, but Melissa has a friend with an RV on a campground up north. The kids are sleeping inside, and Derek and Stiles are in a tent just outside of it. Each day they’ve walked along to buy fresh bread for breakfast, swum in the creek, played Frisbee and ball, grilled over charcoal for dinner, and watched movies on the laptop before falling into deep sleep. It’s pretty awesome. 

Kate stayed true to her word and writes every week to Esther. Sometimes Esther writes back. Kate is working in Nevada and often sends a twenty dollar gift card to Taco Bell or Applebee’s which Esther usually uses to take one of her sisters out for a treat. She’s been babysitting in the area, too, and has been so responsible that Stiles wants to squeeze her proudly every time she comes home. She and the girl from adoption day, Addison, are an item, so Stiles and Derek have had to negotiate their policies on relationships a few years earlier than they were expecting. 

Back home, Kira is expecting a baby boy that they want to name Eli. Stiles’ dad has retired so that he and Melissa can take care of the baby when Kira goes back to work, as well as Stiles’ kids. It’s weird, but to Stiles and most other people, he’ll still always be the Sheriff.

Actually, the new Sheriff of Beacon Hills is grinning at Stiles right now as they eat lunch in the shade of the RV’s awning. He’s at the other end of the table passing finger food to Jacob in his high chair and listening to Lexie tell him about the book she’s reading. 

Stiles grins back. “Back to the creek later?” 

“Couldn’t stop me,” Derek says. 

The girls go to the middle of the creek, where it’s deep enough to swim and play catch with the ball. Adam is playing in the shallows near where Stiles is dipping his feet, bringing treasures from the water back to Stiles’ outstretched hand. Derek is right next to Stiles, playing on the blanket with Jacob, who recently celebrated his second birthday and is getting more independent with each day that passes. 

Stiles leans over and kisses Derek right on the mouth, surprising him.

“What’s that for?” he asks.

“All this,” Stiles says, and waves a hand expansively.


End file.
